The boys are back and this time their discussing the 1991 LP Road Apples.https://ratethispodcast.com/ghtthLIve music from the episode:Cordelia - Roxy 1991Born in the Water - OuttakeThree Pistols - Misty Moon 1990Fidder’s Green - Calgary 2006Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/gettinghiptothehip/exclusive-content

In this special episode of the podcast jD, Pete, and Tim sit down with Gord Sinclair for a broad conversation about touring with the Hip, the future of Rock music, and his new record In Continental Divide. Stay tuned for the big announcement following this episode. If you know you know. RateThisPodcast.com/ghtthTranscript0:00:00 - Speaker 1Well, we're really, really thrilled that you could take some time with us today. This is a pretty exciting And this is my pleasure. 0:00:07 - Speaker 2I appreciate it I. 0:00:09 - Speaker 1Don't know if you know what the premise of our podcast is, but I want to give you a. Snip it so you get a. You get an understanding of who these two gentlemen that you're, that you're with, are sure. 0:00:21 - Speaker 3Maybe you should tell them at the end JD, let's get the Way. 0:00:28 - Speaker 1No way, no way, i'm sorry out. So I did a podcast called meeting Malcolm s and it was about pavement and I met these two guys in Europe last year Going to see pavement a bunch of times and we got talking about music And I really love the way they talk about music, the thoughtfulness and the way they understand it and so, naturally me being a very big, tragically hip fan your, your name came up and Them being from Southern California, one by way of Malaga, spain, and one by way of Portland, portland, oregon. Now They hadn't, they hadn't had much experience with you. So I thought, dreamt up this idea of the podcast taking them through your discography, one record at a time, so that The listeners can experience, can experience what it's like to hear your music for the first time. Again, cool. 0:01:27 - Speaker 3It's been. It's been a journey man, it's been really. 0:01:31 - Speaker 2What do you guys up to now like record-wise? is it still work in progress or we have just released up to here. 0:01:39 - Speaker 1So Okay. Here's a fun fact for you. Did you know that if you take your entire catalog and Release them, starting on May 2 4 weekend, and release one a week for the summer, it ends on Labor Day? 0:01:58 - Speaker 2Oh, no, I didn't know that you're your catalog. 0:02:01 - Speaker 1Your catalog is perfect for the summer man. 0:02:03 - Speaker 2Okay, great, well, that's, that is kind of appropriate. For sure We're, you know, sir It. We're unlike Southern California. We kind of lived for the for the three or four months where You can actually sit outside and play guitar with it, your fingers falling off, you know. 0:02:21 - Speaker 4That's, that's definitely me. in Portland, oregon, we had the the soggy a spring I could remember in my 22 years here. 0:02:28 - Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, that's a great town. We we played Portland a bunch, the Aladdin theater, remember that place. 0:02:36 - Speaker 4Yeah, it's an awesome theater. 0:02:37 - Speaker 2Yeah, it's great Yeah. 0:02:39 - Speaker 4Yeah, it was. It was a cool room. It was fun to play that. We'd love to have you back there with your your current gig. So it would be yeah well, it would be great. 0:02:48 - Speaker 2It would be great. Things have changed for the live music business. Unfortunately, Do it for the most true. 0:02:56 - Speaker 1Yeah, so for now, the tour, the tour that you're doing In Toronto and like Southern Ontario, yeah, is that? is that what we're expecting to see for now, or will there be more dates in the future? 0:03:10 - Speaker 2I mean it's still. It's still up in the air. I I'm certainly not averse to doing more dates, but we, you know, yeah, but, but we'll, but we'll wait and see. You know it's it's it's not an easy proposition. Taking the show on the road, i mean the expenses are kind of through the roof from, just in terms of putting the boys up. That's why we're staying pretty close to home. To start, not only on my band leader now, but I'm also a father. My, my youngest son, is Playing bass in the group and he's got a day job, so I got to get him back. It would be irresponsible for for me to have him run away to the circus like I did, you know. But what it needs to be seen, you know it remains to be seen. 0:04:03 - Speaker 1So how is that turn? turning around to your left or right and seeing your son, you know, in your familiar spot? 0:04:08 - Speaker 2It's, it's, it's, it's pretty great, i gotta say it's pretty great. He's a On his own. He is an amazing musician. All my, all my kids can play, but but he, this one's got a particular Ear and talent Guitar and piano or his principal instruments. He's not really a bass player But he can play just about anything. He's just one of these kids that can hear a melody on the radio or on record and sit down the piano and play it back to you. So, on that regard, it's really, really great to see him actually playing the. The flip side of it is as a He's a singer, songwriter in his own right and it's in the process of finishing a record that he did while he was at university, mcgill. And it's tough, you know, it's tough for young kids starting out today to get that, to get that leg up. You know that opportunity to that a group like ours had, you know where we, you know We were able to start playing gigs while we were in school, you know, and and kind of built it up from there very, very, very organically. We got better as we played more and and and as we played more, more people came and Then we got more gigs and it sort of snowballed from there and, like we like most, we started as a cover band And, crazily enough, like back in the 80s when we were playing, they didn't really want original artists in the clubs in Canada. So we would, you know, we would we were playing mostly kind of B sides of old stone songs and pre things and Kinks and stuff like that and then thrown in on, and so when we played at our song we said, oh that's, you know, that's from an old Damn record from from 1967, just absolutely bullshitting our way because there's some clubs that you had to write down your set list, make sure you weren't playing original material, bizarre. So. So now it's yeah, it's just a different scene. I'd love to see him working and playing, making it, taking a go at it. 0:06:18 - Speaker 4Yeah, i kind of feel like this day and age to Make it in a band and get on an actual tour That's further away than your closest region, it's like, it's almost like becoming a professional athlete. Yeah, you know, it's just like your chance. Yeah, getting that notoriety and getting embraced and carried through it, it's, it's just tougher. I have a close, close cousin of mine is in a band here in Portland and They're going at it so hard and you know they're lucky to get, i don't know, the six, six or eight West Coast swing. Yeah, and happy about it, but I tell you the cost for them and all that. Just like you said, it's, it's, it's, it's a tough, that's a tough go. 0:06:58 - Speaker 2Yeah, it's, it's. It's very much the same here. It's like anything, you know it, that You put a group together, you just, you get that, jones, you know, you do it for the love of it, and if you see a little glimpse of light at the end of the tunnel, it's enough to keep you going. Right, the one gig leads to the next, the next, but, but, boy, if you get continued roadblocks thrown up against you, it's a little demoralizing. And certainly up in Canada the live music scene Was in a tough spot even before COVID, and COVID really, just, you know, cut the head off the vampire It was. It was just made it so, so difficult, particularly at the at the early stage gigs, like in most downtown cores They've been. You know, the small rooms where it would be your first gig when you came to Winnipeg, or your first gig when you came to London, ontario, those rooms don't exist anymore. Yeah, you know, in fact I was talking to my agent a little while ago and Again, it's been a while since I've been out to Western Canada But he was saying that there's not really a gig in Vancouver and Calgary, you know, you know, in a 500 seat capacity and that's, and that's tough when you're just coming through town for the first time. I mean it's tough is on a regional level. If you're a young band story or a colonial, let alone From Kingston, ontario, you know, which is a real shame. I mean, the great thing about being from Canada, you know I The biggest obstacle to touring in this country Is actually our greatest assets, the sheer size of the country. You know, once you, once you kind of break out of your region and play in the crap little clubs around your hometown, then you've got eight, ten, twelve hours in some cases driving in between The, the gigs and you learn really early and really really quickly How to play. You know an empty room on a Tuesday night and a shithole on a Wednesday night With the object of getting to a win, a peg, you know, for Friday and Saturday night and maybe selling some tickets. You either You either fall in love with the lifestyle and the guys in your group or the gals in your group is the case. Maybe you're you bust up before you get you out of our problem, yeah, ontario. And so you get a lot of hearty souls that are doing it and then in the meantime, during all the traveling, you just develop this rapport with your bandmates and if you're a composer at all, it's great. You have so much time sitting in the band or sitting hotel room. You, just you're right, shoot the shit and Become what you become. It's true for musicians, it's true for crew people in this country as well. You know, you look at any international group and their crews are populated by Canadians. Because they have that experience, you learn how to travel. You know, get along with people in a confined space of a Band or tour bus, and it's a real asset that we have. The, fortunately, is getting more and more difficult. 0:10:17 - Speaker 3It's a bummer, because I love you guys you guys own your, i mean, and I we know this. I know this because We've pretty much gone through the, the majority of the discography, at least for the hip, and You guys really honed your skills of those Tuesday, wednesday night shittles, yeah, that you're playing To get you know, you can either take those is like Oh man, there's, there's five people here. What do we do? Like let's, let's, let's, let's treat it like a really tight rehearsal. Yeah, you know, whatever, and it it shows, at least from my perspective, on those records, those early records, and like to you guys just peak and just, you know, coast at 35,000 feet, so to speak. But it's funny you mentioned about the touring scene because I live in Malaga, i grew up in Southern California but I live in Malaga, spain and I We had a record come out last year and we're getting ready to do a second record And it's in the city center. They don't want anything original, they want stones, beatles, you know, maybe a couple Zeppelin tunes thrown in. They don't, they don't want they, they want cover bands, that's all they want. 0:11:39 - Speaker 2Yeah yeah, it's, it's tough, it's, it's a funny time And in a lot of ways I think it's a kind of a dangerous time from a cultural perspective. I mean, i, i'm a Stones fan and I'm a Beatles fan and I'm Zeppelin fan, you know, got it second hand from older brothers and sisters, you know. But but I, honestly, you know, i honestly believe that every generation needs their own stones. They need their. They need, like I grew up on the clash, right, you know, and the jam and and that was I was able to define Myself away from older brothers and sisters because of the tunes that I was like. And then, you know, and I've been Quite honestly, i've been waiting around for the next Nirvana and honest believing in my heart that's somewhere in the world, in some mom and dad's basement, there is the next Nirvana, working it and learning how to do it. I just, i really honestly believe it. I mean, again, i we're very fortunate Over the course of our career, touring, you know, we have Mums and dads that are bringing their kids to the, to our shows, and now those kids are, you know, so great, right, stealing to the hip and stuff, which is awesome. But but I worry, we're For Canada anyway, where that next hip is actually gonna come from. You know, and it's again, i think it's a cultural thing and, and you know, into your point about the Learning how to play the empty rooms, i mean That's what allowed us to. We were back and forth across Canada a number of times before we got the opportunity to Make that left turn and British Columbia and start playing in the United States, and it was literally like starting over. So by that point we were playing like larger clubs and doing really, really well. And then You know, you go down to Seattle and you're back to, you know, 20 to 50 people and and It's actually it's really informed our career. You know, we learned really early on to play to each other, it totally, and and how to play on stage and we always had this mantra we learned to play The hockey rinks like they were clubs and we learned to play the clubs like they were hockey rinks. You know, and Cool, cool. 0:14:08 - Speaker 4I love it. 0:14:08 - Speaker 2And we were really. We were also really really fortunate that we would go to a region like the Pacific Northwest In the States and, you know, at the club live and you could look out and you could see familiar faces, the folks that were really into it, like maybe it actually bought the records and you can see them in the first couple rows and and It was the same when we started in Canada. So we would change up the set every night. You know, try to throw in as many different tunes and we wouldn't open with the same tune, we wouldn't close with the same tune and to make it look like we were Not even look like we were trying, we were really trying to entertain these folks. You know, and you guys are all music fans and there's nothing worse than you know, you catch an act and you catch the, the acclater and the tour and it's like Hello Cleveland on the teleprompter. You know yes, agreed, agreed 100% and it's kind of like If you avoid phoning it in, consciously avoid phoning it in, then you're not phoning it in and You're not thinking about your laundry or the fight you just had with your partner. While you're out on the road You're actually engaged with your fellow musicians and particularly with the crowd. And, yeah, it's important to me as a music fan, you know, i just think it's really when there's still groups out there, you know, at the rink level, that do that, you know. 0:15:29 - Speaker 4Yeah, yeah, to comment quickly about your, your wish for the new Nirvana, like I think it's happening in in these sub capsules, like these regional areas. You know, i, i, i hear about bands doing a West Coast tour and doing in small clubs, smallish clubs, but also doing house parties along the way. And When I first heard this one band, i followed when I first heard they were doing, you know, in between, let's say, san Francisco and Eugene, they're doing house parties in Arcada, california, or Eugene, you know, south of Eugene or in Ashland is like. So they're doing house parties, like people are showing up and getting shit-faced and rocking out and in. To me It was kind of brilliant. It was very old-school feeling like you know, i remember stuff like this happening in the 80s, but at the same time I'm like, Well, if that's a way to hustle and get more fans to support you know, your, your venue climb, then that's that's just amazing. So I think it's happening with, you know, some of these kind of post-punk, kind of yeah, yeah, art rock bands. You know it's, it's happening, but it's it's so, it's so capsule-based, yeah. 0:16:45 - Speaker 2Yeah. 0:16:46 - Speaker 4So to break out of that, it's pretty tough. 0:16:48 - Speaker 2Yeah, i mean that that's my understanding of it as well that the first show I've got is part of a festival in our hometown called Spring Reverb and we again, it's a very, very local promoter who who's, you know? God bless them there. They're all in on live performance and they're they're they're like the Don Quixote's of music in this particular region And they'll do whatever it takes and there's tons of groups on the bill That I haven't heard before. It's and it's an exciting, you know, and it's a. It's a really, really good thing. But I think for your average music consumer, my age, it's like No one's trying to Pitch new music to me in any way. You know which is a real kind of drag. I, i have the dough to buy the records, but I don't know which ones to buy. You know, and it's I Still it's a. It's a bit of a problem. 0:17:47 - Speaker 4I'd love to send you a list. I'm bugging these two guys all the time. Hey, you gotta. You know. I told these guys all the time Hey, please, listen to this. There's one band in particular. I told them three times listen to it. Just make me a playlist. Maybe I'll listen to it later. 0:18:02 - Speaker 2And it's cool. It's never been easier to produce a record, like again when I started. Recording was expensive and you had to have a deal to do it and Someone had to invest the money in it, which, again, was maybe part of the advantage that we had that we did have some resources behind us with our first, even with our first DP, private resources and but you know that that patronage system is, i mean, kind of goes back to the Mozart days where you know folks that had the resources were able to Have house concerts, just happened to be in Palaces, right, right, but right, it's a good thing. I mean. I think you know the kids will find a way. It's just, it's just how, how to take it to the next level. I mean we, when we first started touring the States You know it was still regional radio was a real big deal. It was just before Ronald Reagan and the clear channel days kind of ruined it so many ways where you And it's a real shame as a music fan and as an artist you know you could be stiffen in one market, but then you go to like Austin, texas, for us it's like holy crap, where did all these people come from? And then you find out that a local DJ's got an affection for the band and they're kind of, they're kind of paving the road for you in advance And it was such a great. It was a great time. It was a great time for music. 0:19:48 - Speaker 3It's about what's played to you, gord, because I mean I just want to you talk. You mentioned the Clear Channel thing, but it's about what you're exposed to. Like you said, the DJ, that it's got a, that's got a. You know, it's got an affinity for your band. I know, joke. I'm in California right now because I'm visiting family out here And I saw two of my best friends. One flew out from Texas, the other one lives out and he's got to play some Mexico but he works the train. And so we all met up and on separate occasions I told him about this podcast and we listened to, to some hip tunes and they're like who the fuck are these guys? And and like immediate fans. Strangely enough, and because we have the same like taste in music, the three of us we grew up we played in bands the others were five, but never, never were exposed to it. Yeah, Yeah. Never had it. 0:20:44 - Speaker 2Yeah, we would get that a lot over the course of our career. You know, we've always benefited from really passionate fans that that they would, they would get it, and just the old fashioned word of mouth thing, you know, we would come back through town like 18 months later and they, they would have brought all their friends and maybe got turned into some more corded music, but then they would see the band play live and it would all make sense Like live music is supposed to. It's just like, oh, i didn't even think of that song on the record, but when they play it it's like, ah, you know, that's my new favorite song. And then it grew just really, really organically. You know, we, we never really had the benefit in the United States of a single that was big enough to open up like a national type of market, but we, we, we maintained this ability to tour around this, the circumference of the country, you know, and, um, yeah, and you know, wherever they had a professional hockey team, we would do pretty good, you know, right? 0:21:56 - Speaker 4So And I will say, though, i read, i read, i read you know something about you guys playing the, the Fillmore in the nineties in San Francisco, and there was some comment. It was like, yeah, they always do, they always have a big crowd here because every Canadian in California comes to the show, you know. so it's, it's hard to, it was hard to get tickets because all the Canadians would show up. So, you know, i love, i love the story of how everything happened organically and you guys kind of started from playing small clubs and what have you, and cover songs and how it. that rise is just totally remarkable And it's, you know, it's obviously worthy of of sharing, which we're we're doing now. I I gotta fast forward and ask about this. this uh, air stream, though, and you guys recording and you tell us about that. So cool. We have our own fantasy in our minds right now. Well, it was really it was a. 0:22:54 - Speaker 2Again, it's a kind of a a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a. It's a COVID based reality that that I faced, sure, the group myself, we, we own a recording studio in in Bath, ontario. It's a residential studio. So, um, COVID, it was really super busy because you know, artists, musicians, could, you could test up and and you'd live there. You didn't have to go anywhere and and as long as our, our engineer, um, you know, was safe. It was, so I I couldn't get into it, you know, like I just couldn't. It was booked out and and, um, i had, uh, you know, i'd I'd put out a record called taxi dancers previously And it's one of those things like I had tunes left over from writing with the hip and stuff. She got years and years to do that and then. But COVID was great for me as a, as a songwriter. I was locked down in my home with my family and um, and I was writing and using the guitar and and and writing lyrics as my means of journalism journaling really And I wrote this record fairly quickly. My buddy James, who played with me a bunch, i produced a bunch of records for his band, uh, peterborough, called the Spades, and so we've just always had a really close relationship, And he is an engineer and producer in Peterborough, um, and had this great idea this summer, before COVID, and he bought up an Airstream trailer And he rigged it up so that he was able to strip down his gear from his studio space and transplant everything into the airstream and go completely mobile So he could record live shows and, you know, any sort of situational stuff which I thought was a genius idea. And then COVID hit and it kind of you know, it kind of went on the back burner and then we got talking and said, you know I got enough tunes for a record And you know he played with me on the first one and engineered, so we want to try to do it again. And so he literally recorded it in my house. We parked the airstream in the driveway and ran a snake underneath my garage door and plugged in And it was kind of great. I hoofed my family out and it was just. It was just James and Jeff Housechuck and I are a drummer And we kind of stripped things down. We learned all the songs as a three piece, you know, with me playing the bass and then and then tracked kind of pretty much live And Jeff and I would play together and put the bed tracks down to like a scratch guitar, scratch, vocal and kind of did it like that. It was really kind of wicked and and not only in office is recording is, you know. We learned the songs and we kind of had all the beds done in like three, four days. It was just bang bang bang, kind of like that It was. It was a lot of fun, like kind of old school recording. You know We trying to almost emulate it doing its 16 track. You know, really minimal overdubs and just to get that sound. You know we spent the majority of our time miking up the drum kit, you know, so that we could. You know the Jeff Housechuck the drummer is just a fantastic player, jazz guy, and he decided to slum it with us rock and rollers And he brought that, that complexity and the touch where you could actually hear the notes on the drums. 0:26:48 - Speaker 4Yeah, yeah. 0:26:49 - Speaker 2I could hear it. That's great. We actually ran into him. Ironically, james and I were supporting the group classic Canadian story. but our very first show of the tour that we were doing supporting the troops got snowed out. We got to the bottom of George and Bay and the road was closed. It was drifted in. and so we drove back down to Toronto and went to this great club called the Rex Jazz Club And and Jeff was playing with this organ trio you know like real kind of like just fantastic player and had a couple beers with him after and said, hey, do you want to want to do this If I ever make another record? he said yeah, tommy, and the rest is kind of his. Yeah, it's wicked, yeah actually the phone. 0:27:34 - Speaker 3Yeah, Yeah, No, like, for example, the song over and over. I think it is Yeah. Yeah you can tell. I mean you can tell throughout the record, but like that one in particular. Like, however, because once you lay down your initial, you know your drums and bass, your guitar, your bones you start playing with arrangements. And that I was wondering, like thinking about your process, you know how you go about recording and once you get stuff down, but the way you explain the Airstream that had to have promoted like some level of like creativity, like where you see something you're like let's do this, let's try this, because you're not sitting in a traditional studio, yeah, you know, with four walls, yeah, and a window and like do you know what I'm saying? Does that? Yeah? 0:28:29 - Speaker 2no, 100% That's. That's exactly what we were able to do, you know, within the confines of the house, like I have a small home studio, i have an open house, so I got curtains everywhere to kind of allow, you know, for not only privacy but to kind of the dead and the sound and stuff. We had to be creative with what we were doing and trying to figure out where we're going to put drums and what we're going to do with bass. And it was literally because of the way Jeff played And my natural affinity for records that were done in the 70s that we wanted to, instead of getting the big, boomy Bob Rock kind of like we're going to play in the cabin, smash, smash, smash drum kit, we wanted to, like Jeff plays with jazz sticks, that's, you know it's with. Well, let's put them in this curtained off room where everything's totally dead and and do the do the Jeff Emmerich, you know and kind of play and play and play and move the mic and move the stand until we got the kit sounding perfectly. And then in the meantime, you know, we're rehearsing And James is playing with us, and then we, you know, we get tempos down and stuff and, and you know, do a scratch acoustic guitar and vocal. So we know the arrangement And then Jeff or James would go out into the air stream and we counted off and Jeff and I would play together, you know. And the bass amp is elsewhere in the house So there's no chance of it bleeding in, but we didn't have walls or rooms or anything like that. And again, it was the same process. Most of the bass is not DI, it's, it's. I've got an old, you know, portaflex B15 from 1965, the James Jamerson right And it was kind of like you stick the right mic in front of it And it sounds like, it sounds like Motown, you know, and and that's that's kind of the way we get it And obviously I knew the tunes real well And Jeff is just such a good enough player. That was like, oh, you know, you kind of get it in one or two takes and go out and listen to it. And then again is a cool thing that we go to the driveway, to the air stream, which was really our control room, and you listen to it all stripped away or it's just bass and drums And it's kind of like, oh, it's got even without a lyric and without a guitar or even a music Or even a melody. It's like, oh, this sounds pretty wicked. It's kind of the inverse of being a songwriter where I've always believed if you can sing a song around a campfire, and it can, and it can exist on that level and subsist on that level. And it's like, oh, okay, this is a decent song. And we kind of combined those two ethos and to make this record And it was again, it was just because of the circumstances of making it that you know, we all had to be tested up And we, you know, it was just the three of us and we were also living together and eating together and drinking beer together and playing pool pool table in one part of my house And it was great. It's like it's the band camp, you know it's the hardest way to kill time 0:31:49 - Speaker 1you know, sure, gord, i have a question from somebody on Twitter. We let them know that we were meeting with you And he said it's Craig Rogers from Twitter. And he said, curious if he curious of Gord finds himself writing on guitar or bass more often, or a mixture both with this album and when he wrote for the hip. His bass playing is very melodic, so does he have a chord progression in mind first and then works out a baseline, or does the bass melody come first? 0:32:17 - Speaker 2I primarily write on on guitar, for sure, you know, certainly with the hit, even the songs I would bring to the hip, i would have written riffs and started out on acoustic guitar, not all the time Like they were. on occasion I would try to do something on bass. Bass is kind of tough to sit around on your own. Keep yourself entertained. You know you can play along and stuff. But certainly like my main contributions writing with the hip because we had developed that cooperative songwriting style where you know no one in the group would bring a finished idea to the band. You know we would basically throw out a riff, be it a guitar riff, in some cases a bass riff, and we would start playing together And Gord would start putting a melody on top and a lyric on top And it was great that way. As the bass player you'd like oh here are all these holes all like add melody in here. Or in a lot of cases it was from the middle of songs while you were jamming or sound checks. You know we were always playing And but yeah, it was great fun. I miss making music with those guys big time because it was as a songwriter. It's different now, like you, never when you're, when I was in the hip, you never had to finish an idea And even if you had writers, if you were stuck with something, we would get together frequently And someone always had something new and fresh And that would, you know, cause a light bulb to come on And it would suggest a change that maybe the guy that brought the briefing hadn't thought of it Meanwhile, gord just being Gord, he would be riffing on top and his melody would suggest a change that he would make. And it was great. I loved being in that band And I miss it because it's like you know, like, yeah, you start, i still start the same way, i start with the riff, but man, it takes a lot longer, you know, to come up with complimentary parts and the lyrics and stuff. And again, i credit Gord. I really, you know, i tried to bring some heft to the lyrics that I was writing for this project and my previous one as well, cause he's, you know, he set a pretty high bar as a songwriter you know and can't really you can't really put out a solo record I've said this a few times, but it's absolutely true Like you can't write. Yummy, yummy, yummy. I've got love in my tummy, you know, and feel good about yourself with some of the lyrics that Gord has, Yeah. So yeah, the writing's a, it's a. It's a, it's a fun, it's a fun process. I'm not a sit down and write every day kind of guy. I don't do the Stephen King and lock myself in my studio for 2,500 words a day. You know, I kind of sit around and watch hockey playoffs or baseball playoffs and with the guitar in my lap and noodling all the while, and then you're like, oh, and The cascade begins from there. You know, kind of not really paying attention to either, and It's amazing if you're receptive to the idea, It'll come from somewhere. It's, it's great fun, It's great fun. 0:35:47 - Speaker 1Gordon, i'm so thrilled that you laid down in 2020, you laid down get back again. Yeah, so it was. So we have a like a proper studio version of that song, because I gotta tell you, that was one of the hip songs that I came to early on and in my young hip career, and I was like whoa, this is something that's not on the record. It's like this is like a bootleg, or this is so cool And I gotta I gotta wonder, though, how did it never end up on a record like that? It's such a phenomenal song. 0:36:17 - Speaker 2It's, it's a funny one. I mean that it was That's. It's an old song. I mean that was back from the day when we were we were kind of clubbing it, he just kind of in southeastern Ontario and and we were all learning how to write and we were Writing a little bit together. You know Gord Downey and I would and Paul were living together at a student house But yeah, and it it was kind of a mainstay when we would play live and it was in the running, you know for for up to here for sure as a song. But interestingly enough we We recorded a demo version of it. That was just dynamite. Like You know, the performance across the board is great, particularly by Gord, like he just sang the song beautifully. And it was one of those circumstances where the The, the guy that was helping us the demo, said, oh, that was really really great, one more time just like that and we'll run tape. And we're like, oh, what do you mean? you weren't running tape? and oh, tried it again and collectively we were so disappointed. You know that I don't know we never, we never seemed to Capture that vibe that we had on this unrecorded Demo. You know this is again, we were really young, we were still learning how to play in the studio where it sounded like us and Again it sounds old-fashioned and everything, but it was back in the day We recorded live like we would, you know, put the bass somewhere and you know, drums are in a booth and gorge in a booth And we were learning how to do it, but still get that feeling like with headphones on that, we know, you know It sounds like awesome. We're listening to each other Again and then, yeah, it just never. It just never made the cut. After that, i guess I mean there is a version of it somewhere, at least I thought we had reported it for up to here There is some kind of version of it somewhere. We're finding it Odd with. We've always been signed to Universal in various shapes or forms. We were signed to MCA back in the day. But the tracking down on old tapes, a little demo stuff And studio stuff, is proving very, very challenging from an archival point of view. Like stuff is You'd think it'd be, you know, t, hip or Or it would be alphabetized or the Dewey decimal system or something, but it seems pretty random and stuff is in different storage area Areas and our drummer John has just been. He's just been like a dog on a bone tracking down Material and just relentless trying to find stuff. We kind of process kind of started for us with Road apples and but we were still. We were only able to manage to find Two-thirds of the tapes. You'd think they'd all be somewhere together. You know, when we heard about that fire on the universal lot we hit the panic button like right. You know, wow is our? do you think some our stuff is in there? and then read the list in the paper and there was our name. You know, in between Mel Torme and the down Trop family singers, you know it's like oh crap, i hope we do, because that, that, because, to your point, that's exactly the kind of stuff that we were looking for. Turns out there were dupes and some of its backup in Canada. Definitely Yeah, it's a. 0:40:11 - Speaker 3I just I'd be remiss if I didn't ask a gear question What, what, what, what, what? what type of guitar do you do you like to sit in? Because when you're sitting watching a ball game and you're just noodling or you're just whatever like what's your go-to? 0:40:26 - Speaker 2I, honestly, i've got a. I've got a few favorites, in fact, like there's a song on this, this latest record called change your mind, i I bought a. I bought an old Martin D18, saw it. I bought it sight unseen because it's just always wandered one and down. I Picked it up and Literally pulled it out of the case and it became my main guitar for about a week and that was that that. I Written that song on it within Got probably a day or two, you know it. Just it felt right, sounded right. 0:41:08 - Speaker 1What's that? there's sort of like a dreamy stony sound on that song. 0:41:11 - Speaker 2Yeah, and I would credit the guitar. You know, i guess I I Have a lot of, i've got a lot of instruments laying around the house and I will, you know, i will, i'll trick myself and I'll keep one guitar With a capo on the second fret, you know, and thereby changing the key of the song. But you just, in certain cases, different chord shapes and different you know, composite chords, like you know, a D over G or whatever to sound different in a different key or it'll trigger something melodically and then that will Send it in a different direction. So I I kind of rotate them in and out. You know I I Got an old the first kind of cool guitar about was an old J 160, you know mid 50s old beaver of a guitar, and it's always out on a stand somewhere and I'll Pick it up and I'm playing. Right now I'm going out and playing this old, the ES 125, like a, like a hollow-bodied arched top, electric and And it's been laying around and it's just, you know It sounds kind of got a little more sound to it. Yeah, i just kind of believe in the magic of it. You know that it's just like oh, this, you know it's rules right and sounds right in the. The tones of these older instruments, to my ear anyway, are so nuanced that that each one has a different character and Suggests different things, you know, and some chords sound better on them than others. And yeah, it's so, so it's cool. I like I say, i trick myself and I mix it up. 0:42:50 - Speaker 3That's the per. That's the perfect answer. Had you said this is the guitar, that's trick Bs and me bulls it me right on that school Yeah my question was more what kind of beer we were you drinking where you were recording and the Not as young as I used to be, so I. 0:43:13 - Speaker 2There's always a case of the in this kicking around here, for sure, but I'm more of a light beer guy now. Unfortunately, i just I can't afford to Drink the loaf of bread like I used to when I was a young man. Live to tell it. 0:43:29 - Speaker 4I'm right there with you. Yeah, i'm right there with you, gord. 0:43:33 - Speaker 2Yeah, I'm pretty much a logger and a Guinness guy. 0:43:36 - Speaker 4Yeah, sorry. 0:43:49 - Speaker 1Well, I'd love to talk more about the. I'd love to talk more about the. The record sure. You gotta ask the video to man and we haven't touched. We haven't even touched on the video. 0:43:59 - Speaker 2Yeah, I'm glad you like it. I, i yeah, that's a friend of my, my youngest son's It's aspiring filmmaker and videographer and, obviously, videos on what there used to be. I'm like I'm a survivor of the MTV era where You just saw your recoupable account go up and up and up with your record company because you'd spend more money making videos And you would make the record. But it's. But he's a creative young guy having feral is his name and I I Was reading the newspaper And there was an article I can't think this one Facebook change just named in Metta, and Mr Zuckerberg had proclaimed that the future of the world, the future of reality, is going to be virtual reality. And They ran a little clip of the journalists were testing it out with the, with those goggles or that, whatever that is. I said, wow, this is the future of reality. The graphics are kind of shitty, you know, and and And I bounced it off heaven and I want to make this video about these tech guys that are kind of changing the way we interact with each other and getting rich in the process. And could we make a virtual reality kind of video for this song about kind of love in the VR world? and and man he ran with it. He was like I know exactly what you're talking about. 0:45:34 - Speaker 3And it's clear who everybody is. It's very clear who everybody is. 0:45:37 - Speaker 2He ran into a little problem with the record. Here it was, it was clear, still in the legal department And hit the panic button real quick. But we just, i think. 0:45:52 - Speaker 4You know, it's a good thing when that happens And it was fun. 0:45:55 - Speaker 2The song I think Google Guy has a bit of a sense of humor to it And yeah, i got when all that stuff was going on, when they were talking about how their algorithm there were purports to bring people together was actually the algorithm itself was based on making people butt heads, because there was more engagement when the conversation was contentious, as opposed to fluffy, puffy stuff. And that young woman, francis Hogan, really kind of went official with it. She kind of blew the whistle on these, these guys, and I thought right away to myself like oh, what would what would Joe Strummer do with a concept like this? You know, like you wouldn't know all have very much and try to call the guy out. And it was actually the last song I wrote for the record And it came real, real quick because I kind of got my dander up just a little bit. I'm not a social media guy. I understand how people do it. It's a great way to stay in touch with friends all over the world and stuff, and I get it. But God, imagine if you're Instagramming or Facebooking with your pals. But there was a artificial intelligence kind of trying to get you guys to fight about something you may have said to each other in high school and dragging that your relationship through them. 0:47:21 - Speaker 3I'm sure it's already there. 0:47:22 - Speaker 2Exactly, you know. I mean, i'm in a. I was in a band with my high school friends and, oh my God, we fought about crap that was 35 years old. You know, sometimes it was kind of anyway, yeah, so I yeah anyway, i glad you liked the video. It was fun to do. I'm going to do a follow up. He's one of them for call Yeah, but I don't know, i haven't seen it, yet I'm dying. He's okay. I'll be anxious to check that out. 0:47:56 - Speaker 4I enjoyed the video and the song and the song. Honestly it brought me. There's this kind of 80s feel to it, like it's it's interesting kind of the juxtaposition of I don't know had money for nothing Yeah yeah, and then what? Yeah, I'm not, i'm not sure, yeah it's. Yeah, it's reminded me of I don't know a couple of things, but anyways, the the video is great, and it was just I love the personification of the characters, and it's just. I just really related it. I was, i was in, i was in Italy recently. We were staying with family and I'm kind of a handy guy, so I was helping them do some stuff and I said, well, can you work and we get this? you know, we needed something in particular. My aunt there says, well, we could just order it on Amazon, and sure enough it was there the next day. And I'm like I mean Italy and Jeff, jeff, still knocking on the front door delivering, yeah yeah, it's not so I conveniently unbelievable. 0:48:57 - Speaker 2I totally understood. And obviously the pandemic Unbelievable fall for those companies because all the stores are closed, you know, but Massive. You know I'm from a small, small ish city. You know we got 150,000, 200,000 people here. You know, if the if you don't support your local hardware store owner, who may very well be your neighbor down the street, you know it's, it's kind of like the kind of the 100 mile Right Diet approach to living. You know where you live in a community and if you got a couple Extra bucks for things like I get it like people go to the big box stores to buy 10,000 rolls of toilet paper and junk like that. But but you know I go to the local record store and my local stereo shop and my local guitar store and we shop at a small little market And it's important, you know it's. It's important if, if the pandemic taught us anything, it was to kind of value community Because we would support each other more. And meanwhile, that's what I love to do. Devon's portrayal of the of. They call themselves founders. I understand the founders in the orbiting space station above, above the world, that slowly falling apart. And frankly, that's what I try to articulate in the, in the lyric of the songs, that we all know the reason, and the reason is really us. It's up to us, you know, to build community and to support community And and everyone wants to save a buck. I understand that stuff, but at what cost, you know. And what cost? Yeah, in many cases, like mm. Hmm, there's a lot of each cylinder vans all over North America as we speak, idling in people's driveways dropping off stuff that they ordered on Amazon last night, you know, and there's a cost to that, ever, you know. And that's what I was trying to articulate anyway, yeah, yeah. 0:51:21 - Speaker 4What I notice nowadays on, i mean, i'm in Portland, we're in the city, you know, downtown Portland is about three miles away, and what I notice is, when we don't have any deliveries, like, i'll just stop, i'm mostly home. I'll stop in the house and think, boy, it's actually been quiet today. You know it's. You have to wait for the white, the white noise to go away in order to I have a Kingston question for you. 0:51:45 - Speaker 1These gentlemen we are recording, we're doing a live finale for this podcast in Toronto on September 1st. So Pete is coming from Spain and Tim is coming from Portland and we're doing it at the rec room in Toronto. We're doing like a live podcast. There's going to be a standup comedian, There's going to be a hip tribute band, et cetera. But as part of their coming to Toronto, I've booked us a day in Kingston and I booked an Airbnb just yesterday. What are some? what are some hip, hip must see spots, Some you mentioned a record store earlier, a guitar store. What are some cool spots that we should go when we're? Yeah, I got to hit the store. 0:52:29 - Speaker 2You know what there's there's. so there's so many of it like this. First off, about Kingston. You know I'm born and bred and raised here. I went to university here and you know, like most young men, like Rob Baker and I, grew up across the street from each other And all through high school together and you know, gordon, Paul and I lived together in university And John was a little bit younger than us behind us, but all went to the same high school Parents, on to each other, and nonetheless, like most young men, we couldn't wait to shape the dust off this one horse town off our boots. You know, move on, or big city, and as it turned out, you know, our career took this home, over Europe and North America and traveling all the time And we kept coming back home And because it was home, you kind of learn to fall in love with where you're from By leaving it, you know, and you kind of realize, oh, there's no better place to come back to. And it still is a really, it's a really special place. Even even with the, the dearth of of live music venues and various cities and stuff, we still have five, six places in town that run live entertainment nightly. You know, and I think that's a big reason Kingston is as it is is produce so many great recording artists, you know Sarah Harmer, headstones and the Glorious Suns, and because they all came up the way I came up, you know, you kind of start playing in downtown Kingston and you play the bigger bar and the bigger bar after that. So there's, there's some great live music venues. The place I'm playing in town is called the, called the the Brune factory, which is kind of a multi multimedia approach to live. It's a film place, it's comedy, it's an office building for the local promoter during the day And it's, it's great. It's very DIY in town, you know it's. Also Kingston is an interesting place because it's a university town, a very large, very good university here. So we kind of punch above our weight for for restaurants and actually activities to do. We have a local symphony orchestra to symphony halls. You know it's just there's, it's a, it's a really special place And it's also it's right at the confluence of Lake Ontario and the St Lawrence River. So it's where the Great Lakes kind of funnel all down and the area just east of us is the start of the Thousand Islands, which is again it's we kind of take it for granted. But you guys coming from out of town, you know it's worth jumping on a, on a boat, and you've never seen anything like it. It's, it's just absolutely spectacular, you know, and it's, yeah, it's just really, really cool. There's so many great rooms. You know, the club that we played our first gig was called the the toucan, but it still exists, you know, and it's still still there. It's not a great place to see music or play music, but it's still running live. It's pretty wicked. There's another place called the mansion. That that they're again. They're fighting the good fight. They're trying to bring acts in all the time and get people a place to play. You know, and it's in, it's kind of great. It's kind of a great place to be. I feel very comfortable here. You guys are like it. 0:56:15 - Speaker 3If people, if they have places to play there and there's places that they make available, i mean there's. there's no doubt that's why the city thrives. 0:56:25 - Speaker 2I really think so as well, because people, obviously they people get used to live music being a viable option. You know, that was something that we experienced as young musicians First time we went to Europe. You know, it was again like starting over. But we got to the Netherlands And it was like that was. It was the case of like, where are all these people come from? how do they? but it's because the the nature of the culture and it was back in the CD days, when they were Ridiculously expensive, you know. So you'd have to pony up whatever 30, 40 Gelder's they were called back then so people would literally would go see a band play live before they would pull me up for the record, which was perfect for a group like us, because you know they huh, there are all these Magnificently tall people standing there and all speaking English, hang them boards, every word, yeah, it was great. It's all like. That's all about the amazing thing. I am such a such a believer. It's just so important. 0:57:36 - Speaker 1I I totally feel the song sometimes. Yeah, did you write that? like thinking, live in mind, like, like that feels like a live song. 0:57:46 - Speaker 2Yeah, i Did it's, it's, It's for sure, it's. There's an anger to it for sure, and it's it's not the easiest thing when you're sitting by yourself in a pandemic to To write an uptempo song. But like I, like I was seeing earlier, i was using that experience, i would close the sliding doors of our family room and, and, like everybody, there were moments during when I was locked down or where I was Wasn't quite myself. You know I was feeling. You know, being locked down in the middle of the winter in Canada is You get some dark days for sure, not only Physically dark days, but but the mood kind of translates on you and that's that's really what that song's about. And and I Attempted to turn that frown upside down and kind of went back to the old punk rock me, and It's basically like a confessional more than anything, because it was true, sometimes I felt like I was losing my mind, you know, and and sometimes you know, weed, weeds legal up here and and and so maybe sometimes I'm they've, you know, smoked a bomber a little too early in the day, you know, or maybe a little Bailey's in my morning coffee just to take the edge off. Even quite confessional about that as well. Much sugar in, yeah. 0:59:23 - Speaker 3That's really cool of you sharing my songs with us Share. 0:59:28 - Speaker 1I mean, for me it's been. It's been 38 years of you sharing songs with me, so I really appreciate that and Love that you made time for us today, well. 0:59:39 - Speaker 2I appreciate that. I appreciate that I'm a music fan as well and I and I I Made music with guys I know really well, guys I love, you know, and and We always took it really, really seriously and we always never took whatever success we may have achieved, we never took that for granted, you know, and we knew it was because of the people that liked our music and that supported the group and we, you know, with the past, you know Gordon Lightfoot. It was also such a huge believer in live performance and the love and respect for his audience. you know We came up, you know, very much the same way, just like getting our getting in front of people and, you know, and thanking them. You know, and being truly grateful and trying to allow the music to reflect our growth as people and but our commitment to making really good music and you know I'm I Love it I'm still trying to do it on my own. You know, i'd give anything to have gourd still here and be working my, my normal day job, you know. But but In no small way he still is. You know, he wouldn't have wanted any of us to stop playing, you know, and to stop making music and Yeah, and so I'm kind of doing it to honor him, but it's also it's because it's the only thing I know how to do. I kind of They caught into my, it's my, my yearly cycle of like, oh I'm, you should be making a record soon. I think the song start pouring out. Anyway, i'd go on, but I appreciate you guys for doing this and listening as it is intently, as I Listen to music like that's the way I listen to it too, you know I turn it up. 1:01:31 - Speaker 3Yeah, pleasure's our pleasure We've. 1:01:34 - Speaker 4we've got great time, so thank you so much. 1:01:37 - Speaker 2I'll get a list of places to see in Kingston, and there's some that would be great. It's a pretty, it's a pretty special. It's a pretty special little town. You'll, you'll get the vibe right away. You know, september is a great time of year. Kids are just coming back to school and the and the sailors are still hanging around. It's a touristy town. So there's a. There's a good, it's a good vibe here. It's a nice place to visit. I can't wait. Yeah, i can't wait awesome, awesome. 1:02:02 - Speaker 1Well, thank you so much Thanks for a pleasure, guys. 1:02:06 - Speaker 2I really really appreciate your time. It's fun. 1:02:08 - Speaker 3Yeah, thank you boys. 1:02:10 - Speaker 2Okay, take care, we'll see you real soon. Yeah, thank you. Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/gettinghiptothehip/exclusive-content

Title: That's Grammy shit!Welcome to this episode where we dive deep into The Tragically Hip's album, Up To Here. Join us as we discuss the band's growth, refinement, and southern rock influences that make this album a memorable piece in their repertoire. We'll also explore the impact of producer Don Smith and the impact this record had on our friends Pete and Tim.In this episode, we examine standout tracks like "When The Weight Comes Down," as well as the storytelling prowess of Gord Downie in songs like "Trickle Down". We'll also delve into the possible connections between The Tragically Hip and heavy metal bands like Metallica.Join Pete and JD as they share their thoughts on the darkness found in different parts of Canada and how it influenced The Hip's music. Don't miss this exciting journey into the world of The Tragically Hip!https://ratethispodcast.com/ghtthChapters:- (0:00:00) - Getting Hip to the Hip- (0:10:52) - Tragically Hip Album Review- (0:27:13) - Analyzing Two Songs- (0:40:10) - Tragic Hip Music Storytelling- (0:52:59) - Review of the Tragically Hip's Album- (1:06:56) - Canadian Band's Dark Songwriting AnalysisKeywords: The Tragically Hip, Up To Here, southern rock, Don Smith, album review, Gord Downie, storytelling, Metallica, Canada, music influencesLive tracks featured in the episode:Blow at High Dough - Barrie ON 1990Everytime You Go - London ON 1989Transcript0:00:00 - Speaker 1We're now one episode into this grand experiment, and I'm not sure if we've learned anything concrete at this point. I think it's safe to say that the EP surprised Pete and Tim. Going into this, they were under the impression that the hip is a very special band with cultural significance, and the whole nine and Then their first foray into said music Gave them werewolf baby. Now, before you go sending me nasty emails, know that in my heart the EP has a charming place on the mantle. I wouldn't hide from the music on the EP, nor, however, what I seek it out. Now, though, we move on to a more honed and refined version of our bar band. from Kingston Up to here is a taste of the South, delivered on the backs of songs that have stood the test of time, Produced by a famed knob turner, Don Smith, who had previously worked with the likes of you, to the traveling willbaries and Keith Richards, to name just a few. At any rate, let's just say, the hip picked up what Don Smith was putting down, and together they birthed the classic. That's what I think anyway. What, though, will our friends Pete and Tim think of up to here on their first listen? Let's find out in this episode of getting hip to the hip. 0:01:25 - Speaker 2Long sliced brewery presents getting hip to the hip. 0:01:35 - Speaker 1Hey, it's JD here and welcome to getting hip to the hip, a tragically hip podcast. I'm here, as always, with my friends Pete and Tim, and I want to ask them right up front How are you doing, boys? 0:01:47 - Speaker 3Doing well, doing great. It's Monday, Monday morning in Portland and there's frost on the ground. 0:01:52 - Speaker 1Oh, Really not here. 0:01:54 - Speaker 3Yeah, Yeah, Oh, no, no. 0:01:57 - Speaker 5Molly is. it's Monday night in Malaga and You know it's a thunderstorm right now outside, so I hope my internet holds up, but It's getting chilly. man, We're definitely in the winter, That's for sure. 0:02:12 - Speaker 1Oh god, What does that mean? like 20 degrees. 0:02:16 - Speaker 5It's, it's 16 right now. You know that's. Oh I'm trying for you. 0:02:21 - Speaker 1What is it here right now? It's four. 0:02:25 - Speaker 5Oh god man, No thanks Geez. 0:02:31 - Speaker 1I'm a hardy Canadian, for four is good for this time of year, for is like your coat's unzipped and you're drinking a stout. 0:02:38 - Speaker 5I can't drink those stouts here. Let me tell you, man, I'm sticking a light beer, That's for sure. 0:02:43 - Speaker 1Oh, yeah, I'm, yeah I'm, I'm well into the stouts, That's for sure. So up to here, I believe it's recorded in Memphis. I'm gonna double check that right now. Yep, Memphis, Tennessee, and it's got that sort of muddy southern Field to it. you know it's like a well, It's like a well-worn in pickup truck. you know it's got some, it's got some mud on the sides, Really comfortable to drive. That's what this record is and it comes on the tail of their 87 EP. But in those two years the growth to me anyway seems Market. you know, like there is a market growth in terms of, you know the songwriting and the songwriting, The lyrics in particular. but the but the content, you know is is just a little more Worn in like a great pair of jeans. What do you guys think, Pete? Wow. 0:03:43 - Speaker 5Well, you said something in beginning of the Of your kickoff and it's really hard, because I wanted to make this note, because I know that you, there's probably some pretty hardcore hip fans listening to this. so, given the Yeah, given the fact that there's only a week to To listen to these, to really dig into them, you know, I'm just, Basically, on behalf of Tim and myself, begging for forgiveness. you know, don't send hate mail because it's, it's, It's tough, like it's. I know Tim is really a solid music connoisseur, Probably well more than I am, and you know No, but you know he's, he's pretty thoughtful, But, but, but I thought about it too. like, like bands that I really love, like God man, What would I, how, what would my reaction be for listening to two jokers Who never heard this before and have a week to listen to it? you know what? what would they? You know what I'm saying, Tim, Do you do? JD, Do you feel me like I? 0:04:49 - Speaker 1I feel like there's daggers toward us, you know first of all, Pete, at getting hip to the hip. calm is where you want to go with your complaints about. No, I'm kidding, but You got to think in terms of context. here everyone gets the conceit of the shell. people got this record, people got their hands on this record And they got to sit with it for a year before the next record came out. 0:05:15 - Speaker 5So yeah, yeah, you know, Just asking for forgiveness, but all in all, to what your your your. your point was JD, I mean I did. I know we're gonna go song by song, but I just want to say I I started off with this record. This is kind of the same way I did the other one, the last EP. first I started off on my computer, was not feeling it Pop the pop the earbuds in, went for a run with it, Really started to warm up to it and then I took it out in the car and and JD, you've been in my cars, You know that's got a premium audio sound system in it Yeah and oh man, Oh man, It is. I want to walk into a roadhouse somewhere in Memphis and this band's playing and just whoo, there's a lot of crunch man. Oh, I dig it. I got lots to say, but I'll send it over to Tim. 0:06:10 - Speaker 3Well, I had a similar Reflection. I was talking to my wife the other day and about the band and I Said or you know what if my favorite band was in a podcast, someone else was reviewing it, and What if they didn't like it? What if they loved it or what have you You know in either way? I thought, well, hopefully, if I, you know, if I'm an open-minded Pod listener to my favorite band, Hopefully it would be entertaining, Hopefully it'd be funny to hear these Two schmucks talking about what they think you know and with without much background at all. It's kind of like what I said last time without you know, ever trying a certain type of food. It's like, oh, my god, okay, Let's do this. but I am with this album. I, Yes, I started it in the car and it just seemed like really good road trip music. I totally concur with you, Pete, about it being in the boss, in the car Felt like road trip music, felt like, you know, I wanted to drive to go see a show or go see a show by them. Definitely worked in the car. listen to it at home a fair amount, I think. in general it feels, and no production value. definitely more polished Than the last album we listened to totally. yet You get very familiar, like the storytelling is still there, right? The song structures changed a little bit but like the. the DNA is definitely still there. Compared to the last album, Yeah, it's like pinnacle. 0:07:51 - Speaker 1Top perfection bar rock. Yeah, I heard, You know. 0:07:54 - Speaker 3George Thoreau, good like guitar. I just heard this bluesy rock and roll bar Kind of just awesome riffing and I you know, now that you mentioned it, Being in Memphis, I just absolutely heard some country Wow kind of rock and roll tones in there. Oh, that's big time, big time, Elvis, you know there's, There's definitely some of that in there, from Memphis for sure. more so, much more so than the last album. 0:08:25 - Speaker 1Interesting. So, experience wise, did you prefer this record to the last record or not? or where were you there? 0:08:34 - Speaker 3For me. I kind of likened the last record as a pizza with the works, like where is this going? kind of thing. Throw it all together and see what we get. and this one is for sure an evolution. So I would say, sure, I like it more. but it just to me also just feels like an evolution and I'm curious. I was describing it to a friend, and actually to my wife actually, and she was like it sounds like it's just going to get better And I said, well, I definitely hope so, As we listen. 0:09:11 - Speaker 1Yeah, well, I mean, that's what makes this interesting to me getting your first listens in on these records that were seminal to not only me but to a great swath of our country and places you know near and far. I am curious whether the evolution continues for you, And I think that that's going to be fascinating as we as we roll into things. So, Tim, thanks for that. Now, Pete, what have you got in terms of last questions or comments on this record, Or do you have any? Let me know. 0:09:55 - Speaker 5Oh, there was one question I was going to ask you to JD Diamond status. Yeah, So that's Canada's version of platinum, But I'm curious to know why they have that different status. when, for example, if you have the Stones or the Beatles who are from the UK, does the UK have a different? 0:10:21 - Speaker 1I don't know if they have a different one. I've never heard if they have a different one. I know that you guys have diamond, like America has diamond as well. 0:10:28 - Speaker 2It's 10 million copies. 0:10:29 - Speaker 1Yeah, it's 10 million copies. 0:10:31 - Speaker 2We do. 0:10:32 - Speaker 1It's 10 times what we have. So diamond in Canada is one million and platinum in Canada is 100,000. Okay, I see, And it jives out because America has roughly 10, 10 times the population. So, you know, 100,000 and a million. What's interesting, though, is the province of Quebec, which is, you know, I think, 11, 10 or 11 million people. they have artists that have, in the past, consistently hit platinum status, or diamond status, rather, with 100,000, pardon me, a million copies of a record, which is staggering, You know, when you figure, the rest of Canada has a difficult time putting together a million, a million sales in records. Now, this is all off the table, now that we don't sell records anymore, But back in the day, this was a, you know, a big marker of things. So, yeah, you have Quebec. that just is, you know, able to market themselves to. it's because they can put up stuff in French and they can, they can. you know they have access to that audience. 0:11:52 - Speaker 5That's crazy. Yeah, it was a lot of questions. 0:11:55 - Speaker 1What were you listening to in 89? Do you remember Either of you guys? 0:11:59 - Speaker 3Yes. 0:12:00 - Speaker 1Where are you at? 0:12:02 - Speaker 3I was senior in high school. 0:12:04 - Speaker 1Yeah. 0:12:05 - Speaker 3Yeah, it was everything from Southern California punk rock. Yeah, we had a lot of local punk rock going on and we had you know friends in punk rock bands But you know kind of flip the rock and roll coin. I was also listening to like, oh, a lot of new wave, Holy cow, a lot of new wave kind of influence for my sister And that's everything 80s new wave. And then also I was for a period there like a big fan of the cult. You know I like Epic Guitar. I don't always need it, but I like a band that has you know back bone drum bass, blah, blah. but I love a great guitar player And the hip has definitely some guitar going on. 0:12:54 - Speaker 5Yeah, 89. 89, I was. I was I'm a tad younger than you guys, but 89, it was coming out of like some late stage Steely Dan and and Huey Lewis sports was just, I mean, God damn Nice. I don't think there was a bigger album and we talked about that last week. you know some Huey Lewis vibes in there And then you know, I just feel like I went right into. you know Guns N' Roses and the Motley crew of that time before getting thrust into. you know 90s grunge, like everybody else did with Alice and Chains and and and you know Soundgarden and eventually Nirvana. 0:13:45 - Speaker 1I was a big Pearl Jam guy, That was kind of where I was at. Okay, Yeah, I was a Pearl Jam guy, and but that was later. That was, you know, into the 90s. Back in 89, when this came out, I was listening to hair metal. I was straight up listening to hair metal And I recalled, on the intro, the cold open of the first episode. you know, when I heard the hip for the first time and the impact that it made on me. you know, in spite of the, the garishness of the hair metal that I was listening to, there was something that I really liked about this pickup truck band from Kingston, And you know there's a lot to like on this record for sure. So what do you say? we get into it and attack this sucker track by track. Yeah, good to go, man, All right, So we kick off with Blow It High, Do Welcome back and welcome back to CFY's fourth annual Canada Day Festival for Canada's 123rd birthday. 0:14:54 - Speaker 4We're at very Ontario half the time of our lives. Believe me, this band is going to be very, very hot. We'd like you to listen now to Tragically Hip. He's a rapper like Tizorim, never like the stars To throw some passion, throws a passion in some. just bring him on. We're so close, the best that we get to listen now. But you can't look me in for the smile of your eyes. the further it's gone, the higher I go. And if I'm high I go, and if you blow the cry I go. Maybe I feel fine, I'm pretty, just genuine. It makes no sense. it makes no sense for a track to be unified And if I'm hip-sick you should leave it high. It was the strangest thing. I should move so fast, move so fast in the better way I pray Sometimes, the best that we get to listen. now you gotta remember the smile of your eyes. the further it's gone, the higher I go. And when you blow the cry, I go. Now that the speedway, the same evidence, the same. Well, I ain't no movie star but I can give it hand in a thing In the better way I pray Sometimes, the best that we get to listen. now you gotta remember the smile of your eyes. the further it's gone, the higher I go, And if I'm high, I go. Yeah, I'm gonna fly, I go, Gonna fly, I go, I fly. Now that the speedway. the same evidence, the same evidence. 0:19:25 - Speaker 3I mean to me that just crushed it. as the first song, It just hit the ground running, which I love. I'm really into checking out song orders and there was a while many, many, many years ago, I was hoping to be a fan of song three. There was a cadence to some albums that I really enjoyed and this song as a song one it was super good. This is kind of where I mentioned hearing guitar licks that you'd hear from George Thurgood or you know. it was very kind of smithereens, Tom Petty friendly in that way. Some of the lyrics like oh, what do I have? Don't get ahead of yourself. or faster it gets, the less you need to know. I love that line faster it gets, the less you need to know. It's like, just keep the momentum going, And that's also a song that was awesome in the car. 0:20:21 - Speaker 5Well, I mean, yeah, I mean, what a fucking banger of a first tune, The slide. I had the same thing. I very much got some Thurgood tunes or vibes in there, The way the song starts out, I think, with the drums and then a little crunch guitar, and then that in my notes I wrote down the layers, the way they layer the song into getting it, getting the ball rolling, and it just from no disrespect to the EP, but leaps and bounds, recording quality wise, just production, leaps and bounds. It was just. 0:21:00 - Speaker 2you tell me like well, this is going to be a fucking record. 0:21:07 - Speaker 5I was very excited from that first track, Absolutely All right, We'll stick with you and move into. 0:21:13 - Speaker 1I'll Believe in You or I'll Be Leaving You Tonight. 0:21:17 - Speaker 5Which it took me a minute to get the play on words there. I know I'm a bit dense, I'm a blonde, You can't see that for just you listeners out there, But the riff in there is just so catchy I think. at first I was like, oh, this is like a typical late 80s riff and I'll make that reference a couple of times for a few songs here. But the more I listened to it I was like I want to try to play that. I took out the guitar and I was like, oh, that's cool man, It's just cool, It's cool to play and it sounds cool And I can imagine playing it back in that time I mean, if I was alive in that time. it's just like I don't know. I'm sorry I'm trying hard time, particularly myself, but it's a really love that jam. 0:22:11 - Speaker 1We're not rock critics, so we're people who are telling it like it's Oh, yes, we are. Oh, I forgot, Put your quill away. What did you think of this one Lesser Bangs? 0:22:26 - Speaker 3Yeah, it's kind of a little bit of a similar feel. It was cranking in the car really well, I found myself I didn't know what to call it I was doing the chin back and forth to the cadence of the song. It was like kind of reminded myself. I was like I'm doing kind of the chicken thing right now. Just have this good tempo. The two minute mark around then is when Gord starts kind of talk singing, as he does sometimes, And then it moves into, as Pete mentioned, the big guitar riff. And I enjoy when the structure changes up a little bit. I think the last album I felt like there was more consistency and structure which made me lose my interest a little bit. So I like it when the tempo changes or there's like a build up, slow down, build up. you know This had a good speed to it. There's also definitely some country music influence in there. I mean, I could hear it right away. 0:23:34 - Speaker 1That's so interesting to me. I'd have to listen really hard to hear to find country in there. 0:23:41 - Speaker 3But if you listen to some, yeah, some old school kind of country and it just reminds me of, like, the era from when Elvis started to go a little more rock and roll, Like it. just it's very Memphis. It's definitely influenced by the region, I feel. 0:23:58 - Speaker 1All right. the next track on the record is another single from this record. It's probably one of the songs that if you do meet somebody that knows the Tragically Hip, they might know this song. 0:24:11 - Speaker 3Okay. 0:24:11 - Speaker 1It stands. you know it stood the test of time in their live set Throughout the nineties. it was a fertile place for them to play when they played it live. It was a fertile place for them to jam inside of and introduce or workshop new songs. So you'd get like a record two years down the road from a time that you saw them live and there'd be this worked out song. But you'd hear this rough you know this rough lyric phrase or a lick that maybe is familiar on a record two years down the road. It was such a cool little thing to hear them. you know, jam these songs out and you'd go see them. I would see them like multiple nights in a row and it would be different, Like it wasn't, like they were just fucking around and like it was spontaneous and it was very storytelling and yeah, So I'm talking way too much here. This is your show. New Orleans is sinking. 0:25:12 - Speaker 3Yeah. So you know, I'd love to hear a version of this song where they take it longer or they jam out it and or something like that. because first listen, you know the story is actually pretty doom and gloom sounding It's. you know it's kind of about maybe giving up, I don't know. It just felt like, you know, there was some dark, heavy thoughts in there and then it felt just as as a song on the album. it felt a little bit filler to me it was more staple. it was more regular hip. It just like had the typical structure I've heard thus far Wow. So I didn't think I loved it. That is fucking awesome. I like the idea of the song, but it just felt kind of like, okay, this is a, this is a song. three hip, hip song. 0:26:05 - Speaker 4No No. 0:26:07 - Speaker 1Oh wow, It'll be interesting to hear if this change. I hope so. 0:26:13 - Speaker 3Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, Yeah. No, I want to hear, I want to hear more versions of it. 0:26:17 - Speaker 1Yeah, you should. 0:26:18 - Speaker 3Like I was saying, like it was songs have some, have some change or cadence change or an up and a down, and this just felt like, okay, this is song three. What are we going to do for four? Oh wow, Sorry, hip hip fans who have that as a moment, It's not mine yet. 0:26:36 - Speaker 5Well, I'm going to read from my notes to, but before I do, real quick, I got to say this song just by the title and the way that it started. I got this really weird feeling and I'm going to indulge me for just one moment with a story I remember when Hurricane Katrina hit in 2005. Tim, you remember, I mean JD. I don't know if the news of it was as big in your neck of the woods as it was, Oh yeah. 0:27:05 - Speaker 1It was huge, It was huge. 0:27:07 - Speaker 5But the night the hurricane made, you know, landfall, so to speak. I remember listening to a guy. you may or may not have heard of him. He used to do some something called Freeform Radio. He's the godfather of Freeform Radio. His name is Jim Ladd, Nationally syndicated, but he's from LA, and I remember smoking weed on my patio there and he said ladies and gentlemen, this is going to be really bad. It was before like the hurricane even made landfall and this is going to be really bad. And he started. the song he played was When the Levy Breaks by Led Zeppelin And it was just really dark and haunting. So I got that same vibe when I started listening to this song and I was like, like Gord's fucking vocals on this are up into this song. from everything I've heard from the EP with the most extreme, in my opinion, just the most range, the most talent. Like if I was a record producer and I'd heard this as a demo, I'd be like sign this fucking band, this guy's off the charts. There's a mention of somebody named Colonel Tom in the song And I don't know who Colonel Tom is. JD, if you got a line on this, let me know. But my initial thought was go ahead, Tim or whoever knows. No, you tell us your initial thought. My initial thought was it was a David Bowie reference to Space Up, but I could be wrong. 0:28:49 - Speaker 3I just read two references. One was just, it was about the North versus the South. you know, some war back then, back then. But then I also read a reference said that it had to do with Elvis's manager, which made me think, okay, yeah, Colonel Tom Parker. So I think that's what it ties to in Memphis and all of that. 0:29:10 - Speaker 5That makes sense. 0:29:12 - Speaker 1Yeah they talk about. this is like Gord's first foray into writing most of the songs. He's handling most of the lyrics, but not all of the lyrics. And why am I saying this? Oh, because they talk about his notebook. He was notorious for having always having a notebook on him and just writing down phrases. And you know, like he would write full lyric, full lyrics or stanzas or whatever. But even if he heard something that he thought was cool, like a cool turn of phrase, he would write that down. So maybe it was even, you know, like Colonel Tom from Memphis, and that's literally the only thing that's relevant about that lyric is that one individual moment. You know it might not be the story of the rest of the song, you know. 0:29:59 - Speaker 3Sure Yeah. 0:30:01 - Speaker 1I don't know though. Yeah, Colonel Tom Parker. That's what I've always thought. 0:30:05 - Speaker 5Good, What a song, though, man? What a fucking song. I mean, it is just chock full of dirt, you know. 0:30:13 - Speaker 1It's a dirty song, right It's yeah. It is Dirty, Dirty, It's mighty yeah. 0:30:18 - Speaker 3You know it's, it's. I just thought it was also. yeah, I agree, I agree, I just yeah, let's just. 0:30:24 - Speaker 1There's other tracks that you like better. That's cool, That's totally cool. It's not. it's not on my top 10 list, So. 0:30:30 - Speaker 3I'd like to hear other versions of it maybe other live versions of it and see how they can do it Me too. 0:30:36 - Speaker 1It became a staple. for sure, It was a. it was a staple. 0:30:38 - Speaker 3Yeah, That's. that's exactly what my take of it was. 0:30:42 - Speaker 1Whereas the next song was not so much a staple Early on, it was, but it didn't live on in the set list for forever. but it's a great example of Gord, you know, sort of weaving a yarn here and telling a story and using actual Canadian history but giving it a unique spin. So you know, he's playing with things a little bit, but he's telling the story and then he makes it about his own family. What do you guys think of 38 years old? 0:31:14 - Speaker 4I've got my name in administration So People leave. don't have people left, nothing to feed. The last thing they wanna do is hang around here. Most of came from town from long French name, But one other dozen was a hometown shame. Same pattern on the table, same clock on the wall, Been one seat empty, 80 years and all Freezing slow time, away from the world. He's 38 years old, never kissed a girl. He's 38 years old, never kissed a girl. Music. We're sitting on the table. heard the telephone ring. Father said he'd tell him if he saw anything Other type from the window in the middle of the night. Held back the curtains for my older brother, Mike. See, my sister got a ring. so a man got killed. Love for which prison man's buried on the bill. Folks spend back a normal when they close the case. They still stare at the shoes. in the past, our place, Music, Music, Music. My mother called. the horror finally ceased. He whispered yeah, for the time being, Natalie, No, but show the squad, come make a phone. Said let's go, Michael's son, we're taking you home. Same pattern on the table, same clock on the wall, Been one seat empty, 18 years and all Freezing slow time, away from the world. He's 38 years old never kissed a girl. He's 38 years old never kissed a girl. He's 38 years old never kissed a girl. Music, Music, Music, Music. 0:35:03 - Speaker 5Music. It's crazy. so I ended up this above all songs. I ended up doing the most research on, Started researching the prison and there was a guy who was shot there years ago And his last name was Trudeau and I was like, was he related to the prime minister or what? Like all this weird miraculous rabbit hole that I went down. But getting back to the song, I got to be totally honest with you. So I know you guys feel me on this. when you look at like records during this time that came out, You'd have the first one or two to three songs will be just these fucking bangers. And then song four just you look in the structure of the record is going to bring it down a little bit. It's kind of like, okay, everybody relax. you think about it like even playing a live show. That's just the way that the records were made back in the day. And I start hearing that and I'm hearing this song come in with the guitar And I'm like, oh, this is man. those first three songs are fucking bangers. And I'm like, no, they're just going to be this fucking cheesy. yeah, just, you know, Give me some acoustic, a little bit of love, whatever. And I got to say this is probably my favorite song in the record And it took some evolution on my part because first I started digging in the lyrics And I was like you know there's rape prisoners, murder, like all this crazy shit, And I'm like what the fuck is going on here. And then you know ultimately just the song itself, like the melody and everything involved, Which is it's just. it's a I probably my favorite song in the record. Sorry to spoil your alert, but yeah, loved it. loved it. 0:37:00 - Speaker 1It gave the record legs. I think this is the fourth single from the record, Maybe the third or fourth single. So there were four singles on the record and I want to say this is the third, But it might have been the fourth, so gave it some legs as well. 0:37:13 - Speaker 3Favorite song. I'm just confirming 38 years old favorite song. 0:37:20 - Speaker 5On this record. Yeah, I just think it's really 38 years old. was it never been kissed, never made love? 0:37:31 - Speaker 3Yeah, all that, yeah, Never kissed a girl. 0:37:35 - Speaker 5Just, I don't know man, I feel like and this is crazy, I can't believe I'm going to say this And I'll probably be if you kick me off this podcast after what I'm about to say. I totally get it, But a lot of hip lyrics, especially this song about something historical. I really get some Gordon Lightfoot vibes from man. 0:38:02 - Speaker 1Hey, there's nothing wrong with that. 0:38:05 - Speaker 5You know same name, I guess, but you know, I don't, I just and that guy I fucking fucking loved Gordon Lightfoot. If you don't like it and you want to kick me off the podcast, be my guest, That's the hill I will die on. 0:38:16 - Speaker 3We'll keep you. I think I thought, okay, this is some more kind of dark, gloomy storytelling And I feel like I, you know, on an album, I don't need too much of that, I don't need a lot of that, and me personally. And I also thought, okay, if I'm at a hip show, Some dude next to me is like yelling for this song to be played. I think that's a little weird. like when would they play this song at a live show? It's just like, it's just a little much. you know, Maybe Gordon knew that in the future, true crime would be a thing. you know, podcasts and TV shows and everything. Because it just feels like I mean a song about rape and killing. It's just like how many times you need to hear that? I don't need to hear it very many times. So I thought it was super heavy and you know the same thing Like lyric just too much. Yeah, storytelling is just a lot. you know, maybe I'm too sensitive or something, But I was like, yeah, if I'm at this show with my girlfriend and some dude just keeps yelling to hear this song, we're gonna move. 0:39:24 - Speaker 1I've always said that the hip is really funny with their, because I came from the same school that Pete did With. you know especially heavy metal where it was like banger, banger, banger and then like ballad. Yeah, the ballads would be where you would slow dance and you would make out on the dance floor, you know, after you were head banging and stuff like that. And I just think the tragedy hip does the same thing. they do two slow songs or two ballads on every record, kind of thing ish. But the subject matter is never something that you would want to slow dance or make out to Like. it's always fucking heavy, heavy shit And really when you think about it it's like C, G, D, A minor on an acoustic guitar. you know it's like a three or four chord song that fits in the realm of those heavy metal ballads. But then you put that story about family over top of it and it's like Jesus Christ, this is unreal, Yeah, and you know it overall just comprises them into this epic band that can go there. 0:40:33 - Speaker 3Like not many bands even do something like that lyrically or with storytelling, you know. So, you know it's so. part of me was like, okay, what makes me feel uncomfortable about this? Because I appreciate the music and all the effort and creativity. you know, it's like it's because bands don't really do this often Sinister type storytelling. maybe I know a person or two who kind of fits this mold of a character a little bit to a degree. you know it's just like, wow, okay, What's the next song for me? 0:41:07 - Speaker 5The song when I heard the guitar start and I got to tell you JD I don't know if I told you this, I know I didn't mention this to you, Tim, But the very much got some, you know, with those, those that rock ballads and nothing else matters, vibes from Metallica. And growing up in Downey, where I was born, you know, James Hetfield went to my high school, so, like you, you if you weren't a Metallica fan like you, Or you could be excommunicated from the city. like everybody was Metallica fan Like you. just you just weren't not, you know, a Metallica fan. and getting to Tim's question about why or you, JD, you said why the hip never. I mean it's the eternal question why the hip never broke through. You know, here you got this ballad that everybody's expecting to like dance to at a concert or whatever. but then there's lyrics of, like you know, rape and murder and stuff like they did. they did went outside the box, And that's kind of cool, because not a lot of bands do that Exactly. And so like they sacrificed the ability of being, you know, the ability of of fame or whatever it may be, to have to be a fucking cool outside the box band. I don't know. that's my view. 0:42:36 - Speaker 3Well, there's some also, like I was trying to say, there's some artistic merit to it. you know if, if not, a lot of bands go, go there with something. I mean I mean at the same time, era, late 80s. it's not like Morrissey wasn't talking about doom and gloom with Smith or the Cure or something. I mean it was right there, right in there, but I don't know when it. for me it just hits differently when it's comprised of the sound formula that the hip have, and there he's just like letting the listener have it with this character, and it's just guitar driven rock and roll, it's just. 0:43:13 - Speaker 5It's like a preacher that's telling the congregation like, like he's saying some, some shit to the congregation that, hey, you may not like what you're about to hear, but you're going to fucking hear it whether you like it or not. 0:43:25 - Speaker 1Exactly, I don't know that's. 0:43:27 - Speaker 5does that make sense to you, Tim? 0:43:28 - Speaker 3I mean, that's kind of the way I'm going to provide for you, For sure, for sure, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm not going to jump the gun, but I kind of had a similar, you know, mindset, feel from the next song. 0:43:41 - Speaker 1Well, let's go into it. she didn't know. I was going to say it's sort of dark too. you know it's couched in this blues, bass, lick sort of thing. you get a nice groove in the back with the bass and the drums, but then those lyrics come in and it's like man, yeah, this is some more broken hearted, dark shit. 0:44:10 - Speaker 3At the same time, it does have this groove to it. there's almost this like I don't want to say pop, but there's this, there's this beat to it that is a little bit different than the other songs. it's I don't know, it's it's Interesting. A little bit different but there's like yeah, yeah, exactly it, it, it. to me it ties a little bit more back to the overall feel, not conceptually with lyrics, but from blow it high to like there's a drive to it, there's a good. it embraced me more just musically in the song it's, it's, it feels like a good sing along, like I could hear the song on the radio driving across Canada. 0:44:51 - Speaker 1You do, I'm. I'm very curious why it wasn't a single it's perfect length for a single it's. it's three minutes and 30 seconds. you know it's, you're in, you're out. there's a nice bridge. you get a little bit of silliness. maybe the subject matter, I don't know, but 38 years old, was a single, so yeah. so what do you got? 0:45:12 - Speaker 5Well, I kind of, you know, just sticking with what Tim said, you know the amount of tragedy fitting with the name of the band involved in the lyrics. I really think, because a lot of the, a lot of the sound that that that Memphis, correct, it was recorded in Memphis. Yeah, that that vibe is just, it is consistent. I mean, I feel like if you asked me where do you think this record was recorded, Pete, I probably would have said Memphis, if I, if, like you, had a gun to my head and I had to guess, just because this the overall sound of it. And one thing I noticed really strangely and I don't know if you got this too, Tim JD, you may have noticed this listening to it so many more times, but moving from the end of this song into boots or hearts, there's a vinyl crackle. there's a tape crackle and and maybe the hardcore hip fans will get this. So at the end of she didn't know if the song ends with like a tape crackle and then the begin. it's something you don't, at least I didn't hear on any other songs. you hear a tape crackle at the beginning of boots or hearts. 0:46:39 - Speaker 3I heard it. 0:46:40 - Speaker 5I know you're talking about you know I'm talking about it, just I heard it. 0:46:44 - Speaker 3I heard it on my, on my sono speaker. I heard it and I went back and replayed it and stuck my ear over there. I was like what the hell is that sound? I mean, I'm familiar with what that sound is but yeah, I thought it was like coming from outside or something because it wasn't on any other tune and I was like right right. 0:47:03 - Speaker 1I think if you did it on more tunes it would take away from it, but to me it's. to me it's like just an accoutrement. that's like there to remind you that this is rustic, this is, you know, this is coming out on CD, but this should be, you know, like vinyl was. vinyl wasn't as popular in 1989 as cassettes and CDs were. CDs were really just emerging, but cassettes were like huge but it was still recorded on tape, I would imagine yes, yeah, yeah, yeah for sure, for sure yeah so you add a little bit of that into it and it's like you know it makes it sound more like authentic. 0:47:41 - Speaker 3I don't know, that's just my, I mean back back then you know BC boys were doing some like needle-hitting the the disc sound to start off songs. or you know, back then people were take starting to take other sounds as the beginning of songs or even ending songs or whatever. so I think it kind of it fits, definitely fits for 1989 let's go to boots, baby there's a line in there. 0:48:06 - Speaker 5I don't know if there's one line in that song that gets me anybody. anybody want to throw a guess out there? I don't know. no, Tim. Gady, no, okay it's even babies raid raised by wolves. know the wind, he's just like what? 0:48:24 - Speaker 3yeah, man, dude, that was the second wolf, the second wolf reference earth song. right, you know for sure there's more to come imagine what it will. 0:48:36 - Speaker 1hardcore fan I'm not joking, there's more to come these f**king douchebags man this song to me it felt really long. 0:48:46 - Speaker 3that it was not long and it felt like a little more country than the last ones. definitely, you know boots or hearts come on. you know it's like okay, is this the crossover song to the south of the United States to get more fans? yeah, I just the lyrics was a single yeah, for sure, I can't imagine a single, but it was a single who was managing these guys at the time who were like we got it, we got it, we got, at least get the south, because if you get the southern belt of the US, that's like that could be a business, you know so yeah, when I heard the song, I was like, oh yeah, I get it. they were after something here and it seems very it's too much more country to me, so I just kept moving well, if you know, you also have to think too like. 0:49:35 - Speaker 5I don't know how long the recording process took for them, but if you're, you know you're Canadian boys. from where, what? which province are they from? JD? 0:49:45 - Speaker 1they're from Ontario, so they're from where I am, about two hours, about two hours east of where I live. they live in King. there, they came from Kingston okay, yeah, Kingston, that's right. 0:49:56 - Speaker 5so, if you know, maybe they, maybe they individually travel, but you're all there as a group of people, you're recording a record, it's your first full length studio album and you're spending time in Memphis, Tennessee. I mean, I see what you're saying, Tim. then maybe the manager, the the high rubs for maybe like, but guys, we got a, we got to do this. but also, you know, it's the same thing, as you know, that that culture takes a hold of you. you know you spend JD when you over in the UK for the pave tour for a while. how quickly did it? I mean, we don't say it in the United States, but how quick did it take you to say cheers instead of thanks? you know, yeah, yeah, it only takes a couple of days and then asking for the toilet. 0:50:46 - Speaker 1that's, that's the. that's the biggest thing for me. like I just thought, like it sounds so rude, like where's the hey man, where's the toilet? you know, it just sounds rude, but it's just what everybody says. yeah. 0:50:59 - Speaker 3I got it to say that really clear yeah. 0:51:04 - Speaker 5Tim, how long did it take you to say little symetheos when you were over here in Madrid? 0:51:08 - Speaker 4I mean, you know, I've traveled around yeah, yeah, yeah, not long it's a song called every time you go there, I got my hands, the numbers be up, my smile's right in my hands. Every time you go, every time you feel what I see. Every time you go, heart and eye feel me. Well, down here, but I take two kids round the gas like no place. Say the thing is time when things start, The dance, the wilds of charity, no time to rise, to get afraid. They were pissing, pissing, playing a part. She's a lover, a man, a soul, a game of games, Say the door. I'll remain in the corner of your lips And I was made up of my smile. you're both a man. Every time you go, every time you feel what I see. Every time you go, heart and eye feel me And it makes them feel. let me dance through the air to feel Love me, love, love, love, love, love, love, love, love, love, love. Well, I tell you, every time you go, what I see. Every time you go, heart and eye feel me. Every time you go, every time you go, what I see. Every time you go, heart and eye feel me. Every time you go, heart and eye feel me. Oh gosh. 0:54:37 - Speaker 5Go ahead Tim please. 0:54:39 - Speaker 3I feel like this is just a total hip song. It's got good structure, has awesome drum, backbone beat. I like the chorus ad. Not all their songs have a strong chorus, So I like that aspect of it. It felt like maybe the last quarter of the song felt a little repetitive, like excessively repetitive, Like it just kept going a little bit. But I don't know, man In the Big Snake Pit, it's a song about taking risks, falling in love. What else about it? It's still kind of on the emotional high spectrum to me. But it's a good song. It's a oh. what did I have a note here about? Oh, the drawn out dramatic ending with the vibrato Just becoming a hallmark signature of some of the hip, And I'm just slowly accepting it as one of their things, Because it was really shocking to me on the first EP to hear excessive vibrato. It's like woo Yeah. 0:55:56 - Speaker 5Let's go. I gotta say, gentlemen, this is the only song on the record that literally my notes are. I just it's just nothing. I listened so many times I'm like what the fuck am I missing? And I don't know. It's one of those songs where maybe, hopefully, in a year or two years, and I listen to it and be like dude, yeah, there it is, But I just didn't. it couldn't, it was a sleep placebo, I just didn't do it. I don't know why. 0:56:34 - Speaker 3Well then you should talk about the next one, because I was similar with when the weight comes down. 0:56:41 - Speaker 5Okay, I really liked the structure of the song. I liked the tone of the guitar, One of the things this and well, another one I'll get into But I really think there's a lot of thought put into the guitar tone there. Maybe people I just think at that time people were really obsessed. There wasn't a lot of tricks you could do on things like Logic or Pro Tools or whatever. So whatever was coming out of that speaker was what was going to be on the tape. The guys were like dialing shit in, but the harmonies on when the weight comes down. I think there's talent there, but it just takes away from the meat of the song. If I would and there's other songs on this record where I love the harmonies, but for me that song just it just sounds like maybe just in age Well, I don't know 10 more years. 0:57:48 - Speaker 3I very few notes. I just thought, yeah, it's all right. I thought it was kind of heavy weight comes down, I don't know. 0:57:57 - Speaker 2I didn't. 0:57:58 - Speaker 3at that point I was yearning for something a little bit more different through the tracks which I think I got with the next song. 0:58:05 - Speaker 1Well, that's good, because you're starting to disappoint me here. 0:58:09 - Speaker 3Well, trickle down. I mean Gord's voice. he gets a little more adventurous with going low and high and high and low. There's a kind of a change at a minute and a half where the lyrics pause and you get some actual music, Like he's storytelling a lot through these songs. He's singing, getting to the chorus. The jam keeps going through many songs, but this one there's actually a pause with lyrics and you get some good. you get some good guitar There's like kind of these swing back into the lyrics with guitar. I don't know, I thought that was just better, a better composed song. You know the idea about it. you know being poor, being on welfare, waiting for the check. you know I think it's a song that probably was appealing or easily identifiable across Canada or the US at the time being down and out on your luck financially. I mean, who has not been able to identify with that? So to me it was a pretty great song. This was up there more. 0:59:27 - Speaker 5Well, I trickle down my notes. I wrote half on a paper, half on my phone. Again, guitar tone. I remember one of my first guitar teachers had a Mesa Boogie triple rectifier stack and this guy was obsessed with tone and just very similar like early 90s, late 80s, sort of hair bandy, but just that tone, just there. that's there in that song And this reminded me of like when I was listening to that song I pictured Patrick Swayze. do you know the line in Roadhouse when he goes always be nice till it's time not to be nice. I feel like like I just like I just got that vibe dude, This is a banger, Love it This takes. I feel like the last couple of songs dipped down a little bit for the record. It's a bit of a, of a valley, so to speak, And then it's like man, put your, put your boots on, man, we're going back uphill And this song takes me right back there. 1:00:38 - Speaker 4And I loved it. Love it Same. 1:00:40 - Speaker 2Loved it. 1:00:41 - Speaker 1Yeah. So now that we're uphill and our boots are on, we get. we get what could be. I'm going to tip my hand here and I'm sorry to tip my hand before you guys get to weigh in The 11th track. the last track on this record is on my top 10. Okay, But I don't think it should have been the last track on the record. I think the last track on the record should be another midnight. 1:01:09 - Speaker 4Okay, So I'm going to tip my hand here and I'm sorry to tip my hand before you guys get to weigh in. Okay, So I'm going to tip my hand here and I'm sorry to tip my hand before you guys get to weigh in. So I'm going to tip my hand here and I'm sorry to tip my hand before you guys get to weigh in. I think this was the last track on the record. And the mountains stand high. When the mountains stand high, Can't let us run wild For another midnight, For just another midnight. Perhaps we'll run our election day Pumping hands and kissing all the babies. Ain't no time for a shout of doubt. So maybe is there another way? Or where a storming catalach Racing for a roadblock in the distance, Flashin' by a lifetime in an instance. Can we take it back? Am I is dying? Am I is dying? And the river don't sleep? When the water runs cold And the calender burns And the story unfolds, And the mountains stand high. When the mountains stand high, Can't let us run wild For another midnight. Can we take it back? Can we take it back? Can we take it back? Can we take it back? And the mountains stand high. When the mountains stand high, Can't let us run wild For another midnight, For just another midnight, For just another midnight, For another midnight. 1:05:01 - Speaker 3I'm down. I think opiate it is a. it's just. It left me either wanting to take a break from the hip for a bit and listen to something else Or, like just it was, I was a little stumped. 1:05:14 - Speaker 1Too dark for you, I guess. Well, let's focus on, let's focus on another midnight first then. So where do you, where do you stand on that track? 1:05:27 - Speaker 3I overall yeah, I overall liked it. I don't have a whole lot of notes about it Overall liked it. You know, I thought it fit well in there. There was, as I kind of said about Every time you go, there was a better mix between verse and chorus. you know, with song structure, I love the one lighter that we're all, or we're a stolen Cadillac, Like you know. I'm going to use that. I love that. That just makes me feel the pain of, you know, escape or trying to be better, do better, I don't know. I thought it was a pretty solid track. 1:06:05 - Speaker 5It's funny that line stood out to you. I mean, I noticed it. I love this song, man. I actually would have put this song at the end to close the record too, And I'll give you my thoughts on opiated. but the line that stuck out to me the most was Burning like a cigarette long season. And then the chorus, the core. I don't know if you'd call it the chorus, You'd call it maybe the pre-chorus, because Oh My, He's Dying is the chorus, more or less. I don't know, I don't write songs, I'm not a musician and I don't play one on television. But and the river don't sleep when the rottar one runs cold, That entire stanza, if you will. I don't know if we're going to call it. is it's fucking dude? I mean, that's Grammy. shit, man, That's. Grammy shit, It comes together with the music. so well, I'm like man, that's one of the things that when I listen to this record, I'm like, yeah, why did that band not fucking peak in the US and all over the world? Because that's so good, It's so good. 1:07:19 - Speaker 3I mean, this could have been like a track three. It was just a great song, good momentum, and it just had the makeup for it. 1:07:30 - Speaker 1for me, Yeah, I would have made it a single, for sure. 1:07:33 - Speaker 5Yeah, totally. 1:07:35 - Speaker 1It's a little long 356, but you could probably trim it up a bit, But I wouldn't because it's perfect. But yeah, I think it's a great, I think it's fucking great And it's just making me think. Tim's reaction to this album as a whole at this point is making me come back to the fact that these guys at this point are like 23, 24 years old. This is some dark shit for young men to be documenting And it makes me wonder if that's a reflection of. you know they've been advanced since 84 in Canada. At this point they have a manager. you know they're booking things. They're not just, you know, driving around willy-nilly touring, They're doing full on tours that are planned out and they spent a fuck of a lot of time on the road, And in Canada that's that means driving all night, like to get from city to city. you know you're driving hours you're driving. you know it's like the last song we listen to, Like another midnight, like. I know it's not couched in that way in the song, but you could take it that way because to me, What I'm getting at here is this is a road record, This is a. this is their first record. This is, you know, the EP is almost like those first four Beatles records where they're playing cover songs. They're still doing their garage act, but this is this is it. This is life on the road and all the shit that comes with it. 1:09:20 - Speaker 3So mr Leiden, like that to me, says you know a lot about the songwriting style, But I'm wondering what you think of the songwriting so, yeah, I briefly, you know, looked into Gord songwriting, how he did it, and so much of it led me to believe that he was, or they were, meeting Band, meeting people on the road and hearing these you know tough stories and you know, just Putting those into song, Yeah, that's the only thing I could come up with. he wasn't sitting around To me Making up these stories like they were influenced by something, and that's how a lot of great writers and poets are. like David Berman, I think a lot of what he wrote was about people he connected with at bars, sitting around on a barstool, you know. 1:10:11 - Speaker 1Interesting. Yeah, I'm not sure. What are you thinking there, Pete? 1:10:17 - Speaker 5To be honest with you, I feel What you said, JD, about. you know the darkness for these people, this young, and you know I often think about. you. know the way and Tim can relate to this. JD, You cannot, because, just by virtue of where you were born, you know A lot of the way we view Canada is, you know, and to put it in just the most beautiful terms, It's Snow, it's bears, It's manitoba, It's maple syrup, It's mounted police, everything's jolly, you guys have health care and Everything's grand north of the border, on the roof of the US. you know, in the most simplest terms now, When I look at and in JD this, you and I have talked about funny things like, You know, the show trailer park boys, right, and yes, I'm making a big Canadian reference there, Right, as funny as that show is, Tim, I don't know if you've ever watched it It's not very plenty plenty. Well, you know, as funny as that show is and I love it to my boat, to the core of my bones That reality in Some parts of Canada, you know, we don't view parts of Canada as being like, You know, some really dark, dreary parts of Portland, where you're at, or me being from LA, or Long Beach to me, To be more specific, There are some dark ass parts of Long Beach and it's, you know, That has I don't know what Kingston's like, I don't know where these guys grew up, but I'd have to imagine, you know, being on the road and seeing, being exposed to different, different things had influenced their, their lyrical content to this, to make them go to this really dark place. and Maybe that's why, again, they didn't, they didn't break through to the States. But I think it's all for the better, because I think the art would have suffered had they, had they done so, You know, are they not? Yeah? 1:12:28 - Speaker 1Yeah, Yeah, I'm, I'm interested in that. I mean, definitely the specter of Milhaven lives large for a Kingston er growing up in the 70s, I have to imagine, But I don't know. but I like the idea of the amalgam of their you know roots Combined with all this time on the road, Accounting for that sort of songwriting style. you know what I'm saying. 1:13:00 - Speaker 3It's gotta be why they had a good following in Detroit, you know, Cleveland, New York, All that whole region, because that's like some tough living around there and I in this, this Band, I think resonates with so much of that, so much of that. 1:13:22 - Speaker 1Yeah Well, fellas, That's up to here. There's only one thing left to do in this episode, and And that is for you to pick your playlist song, your MVP of the album, if you will, And let us know what that is. so I don't know. I'm gonna close my eyes and point. 1:13:54 - Speaker 5What are you doing this to me, man? 1:13:56 - Speaker 3I'm just gonna go. yeah, I'll go blow it. I do. I is, that's, you know, like you said, Pete, a sister banger. it got me right, right at the right, at the opening of the gate. 1:14:07 - Speaker 1I wonder if that's where your your view of the album as a whole comes from then as well, or it's influenced by The idea that you know your favorite track is the first track. You know it should get better than that, right, like again, We're talking about song Structure here, not structure Sequencing. you know, like blow it oh is like the perfect song to Open a concert or open an album, but It's also tough to get bigger than that. 1:14:44 - Speaker 3True, I think it we start to with trickle down, or every time you go, definitely every time you go, it just has a A more singable single, you know, on the radio aspect to it. I think I'm just trying to, you know, find What resonates most with me with this band and where I'm gonna see them Stay at, I guess sort of thematically, and how they evolve, you know, and and how I wanted them I maybe subconsciously to evolve, especially on the production side of things that for some did it Gotcha. 1:15:23 - Speaker 1All right cool. How about you Pete? 1:15:27 - Speaker 5It's a tough draw. I mean blow at the high-doh or 30 years old. I mean flip a coin. 1:15:36 - Speaker 1Won't do it. I won't do it, No no, no, it's fine. 1:15:38 - Speaker 5Okay, so I'd say the first track to it, Just it. just. there's the thing that the reason why I'm saying that over 30 years old because I remember listening the first time 30 years old be like And I don't want this the person Who's listening this playlist to start listening and be like You know, I want them to like, just fucking love you, right, You know me, I want them So Holy. but yeah, blow at the high-doh. 1:16:11 - Speaker 1All right. Well, thanks so much for doing this again, fellas. We'll talk again soon, and and We'll keep on getting hip to the hip, Looking forward to it. Thanks, JD pick up your shit. 1:16:34 - Speaker 2Thanks for listening to getting hip to the hip. Please subscribe, share, rate and review the show at getting hip to the hipcom. Find us on Twitter and Instagram at getting hip pot and Join our Facebook group at Facebookcom slash groups slash fully and completely. Questions or concerns email us at JD. at getting hip to the hipcom. We'd love to hear from you podcast, some such. Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/gettinghiptothehip/exclusive-content

Title: Straight outta Kingston!Keywords: Tragically Hip, Canadian rock, podcast, musical journey, storytelling, discography, live tracks, vinylIn this episode, join JD and friends Pete and Tim as they embark on a musical journey into the world of the Tragically Hip. As die-hard fans of the band, they discuss their experiences and thoughts on the music and storytelling of the Tragically Hip. From their early beginnings to their debut album and beyond, JD, Pete, and Tim break down the tracks, compare studio and live versions, and explore the unique sound and identity of this iconic Canadian rock band.https://ratethispodcast.com/ghtthChapters:(0:00:00) - Getting Hip to the Hip(0:07:46) - Musical Roots and Taste(0:17:52) - Canadian Rock Band Discussion(0:36:02) - Exploring the Tragically Hip's Debut AlbumJoin the discussion on Twitter and Instagram at @gettinghippot and join the Facebook group at facebook.com/groups/fullyandcompletely. Questions or concerns? Email JD at [email protected], rate, and review the show at gettinghiptothehip.com.The live music featured in this episode comes from:Dead Flowers - 1985 BathAll Canadian Surf Club - 1989 LondonTranscript0:00:00 - Speaker 1Hey, hip bands. it's JD here. Have you ever imagined what it would be like if you could listen to the tragically hip for the first time again? This is something I've spent a great deal of time considering. I can still remember my first experience with the band, While it was a while ago. I still remember it like it was yesterday. It was July of 1990, and I was working in a small town quick serve restaurant in Dairy Bar called Yeti's Arctic Safari. The new owner, Jeff, brought in a stereo system to replace the dinky radio that had entertained us with classic rock while we worked. He had a mix tape that featured a band he called The Trag. As the first notes rung out, something happened inside of me. The music resonated with my 13 year old self. I could feel a change coming over me that was more powerful than the puberty I was working my way through. It was hard rock, but it was different than the hard rock I was listening to at home. Instead of dripping with machismo and bravado, this music cut deeper to me. It featured lyrical twists and turns. the phrase that left me wanting more. Fortunately, I got to come of age with The Trag, the hip. Most of my experiences I discussed on the podcast fully and completely with my friend Greg, And while that podcast satisfied my desire to share my takes on one of Canada's greatest bands, it still didn't hit the mark of taking me back to that moment at Yeti's Or the longing I felt listening to Road Apples, the ahas I had with fully, completely, The coming of age I experienced with Day for Night, Or the simmering beauty of Trouble at the Hen House, And so on. That's where this podcast comes in. You see, my friends Pete and Tim have never heard of the hip before. It turns out there are a lot of people who have never heard of the band before. So for those of you that fall into this category, experience the music of the tragically hip along with Pete and Tim as we travel the discography and tackle the music and storytelling of our band, the Tragically Hip. If you're already at Die Hard, listen along and hear what they know, what they notice and how often they get it wrong. Every week we'll tackle a new record. So strap in and get ready to listen to the hip for the first time I'll get ["Tragically? 0:02:17 - Speaker 2Hip"] Long Slice Brewery presents Getting Hip to the Hip. 0:02:33 - Speaker 1Hey, it's JD here and welcome to Getting Hip to the Hip. I hope you are ready to rock and roll. I know my friends Pete and Tim are. Let me just take their muzzles off here and let them have at it. Fellas, before we go anywhere, tell me why you did this, Because it could turn out like incredibly sideways. I don't know where this is gonna go. I think that this is the greatest Canadian band of all time And I think they rank in the world stage as well, but you guys haven't heard of them. So, Tim, what do? 0:03:10 - Speaker 3you think, Thanks for having us, JD. I hope, I hope, I hope. I told my family what we were up to and my oldest son was like alright, do you like this band? If you listen to this band, are you gonna be able to do it? You know this is gonna be like a fucking marathon listening to all the albums. And I said I'm not really sure. You know there, this Canadian rock band from what I know. I remember living at the beach in San Diego and one of my neighbors had a tragically hip sticker on his truck and I always wondered like that's weird, a band popular enough to have stickers on a bumper of a truck. but I don't know who it is. So you know, there's not a lot of bands you know from the past 10 to 20 years who made it kind of big that I'd never, ever listened to any song from. So yeah, we're curious to see where this goes. And you know, of course I've listened to Rush, I've seen Rush play. you know there's all kinds of music out of Canada Arcade Fire, and you know more present. So let's see what the tragically hip is. We'll see if it's gonna be tragic or not. Oh, oh. 0:04:36 - Speaker 1Maybe it'll be super hip Ground. oh God, Oh, he doesn't stop. You wind this guy up and he just does not stop. Oh, finally, P Ground control to major P Yeah yeah. 0:04:51 - Speaker 4So I got into this. this was a court ordered thing for an offense that I've made one time. No, no, no, JD, you asked me to do this and you know I actually have heard of the tragically hip and it's funny because back in like I wanna say, the mid 2000s, like 2006, 2007, I was working at a bar. I knew a couple really good folks that used to come in there a lot. They were both Canadians Kurt and I can't remember the other girl's name And there were a couple and we used to talk about trailer park boys all the time, which they loved. They would always talk about tragically hip And it's kind of one of those things that, like, can't really force anything on people. You know, you gotta kind of just lead the horse to water and hopefully they drink. And then, more recently, in like 2018, 2019, I ran into somebody else and they were just like check out this song and download this out on Spotify And love it was my favorite album. You're gonna love if you like this and I'm just like it. just it wasn't organic And I'm hoping that this, you know, this adventure that we're all three embarking on will be. you know, it'll take, so to speak, because previous attempts had not done so, And I'm excited, though, but I know it's gonna be a big sandwich to take a bite out of, that's for sure. 0:06:29 - Speaker 3You know JD JD, if you would depend. you know some dude from Florida or I don't know. you know somewhere else in the US and asked me to do some other band, US based band or something. I don't, it's hard. my point is it's really hard to say no to a sweet Canadian guy. 0:06:49 - Speaker 1So yeah. 0:06:50 - Speaker 3So you know, it's like I said to my wife Amy, you know JD, who she had heard about but not meant to ask me to do this like multi week podcast about some band I don't know. And I'm a little concerned like what if? what if me and Pete were just like JD? we're gonna have to end the podcast early. We don't get it, you know, but I'm sure we all get it. 0:07:15 - Speaker 4What JD didn't tell you is that the original this was originally gonna be a Papa Roach podcast And we're gonna go through the through the discography of Papa Roach, but last minute he changed it to the end, so thank God, Yeah So where are you No? 0:07:34 - Speaker 1offense to. Papa Roach, Where are you guys hailing from at this point? I mean, I know, but if people are actually listening to this, that means that we completed the task. So that's one thing. Where do you come from And where do you come from musically? 0:07:53 - Speaker 4I live now. I live in Malia, Spain, which is in the south. For those of you who can pick Spain out on a map, it's the closest part to North Africa. but I come from Southern California, born and raised in the LA area, more specific the Long Beach and Downey area. Most of my life in Long Beach, though. Musically, help me out, man. 0:08:27 - Speaker 1I think you're both, like, big fans of music, like the full spectrum, and that's why I chose you, Like you know. 0:08:36 - Speaker 4I'm not, let's put it this way, I'm not a Steve Albini. I don't diss any type of music. Okay, Steve Albini fans out there, I just I let I like there are music that I will gravitate towards and listen to, which tends to be rock and roll, indie rock, Stuff like that. but yeah, I'm never gonna sit there and go. you know, I don't. I didn't like Kendrick Lamar's record. I don't think you should have got out of mother air. Fuck that. like whatever dude, to each his own man. Some people really like it, some people really like this and that. so even those who like poppy roach started bring it up twice. 0:09:15 - Speaker 3We know, we know, we know it. next, the vinyl. Yes, I've lived in Portland over 20 years, just over 20 years this year, But I hail from Southern California as well. So I'm kind of just like a West Coast, you West guy I guess, but lived overseas for a stint of time and hope to do it again because we Head over to Europe at least once a year. Musically, you know, I don't Play anything but air guitar really well, just kidding, kind of not mediocre I guess. and I've, I will listen to a lot, of, many, many genres of music. if you, if this was to not to be like some contemporary Country artists, I probably would have either killed you guys through the, the interwebs, or myself or all of us. That's about one of the genres I just can't do. but yeah, I Drew up, I guess you know, listening to FM radio and Making mixed tapes on cassette and yeah, baby, you know, like I, I could hear. I was telling my son this year that I could hear the first seconds of a song and have record Set up on my tape deck It just record off the radio. So you know, huge music fan from early age, like fifth, sixth grade. So been listening to music forever and a fan forever and at one point, like huge AD of you have lists and track things, Like I tried to start to try to formulate, formulate the shows I've been to in my life, the gigs, because I'm still a Often good goer. I'm still recuperating from the one I went to last Friday night, But, gee she, I've been to lots, of, lots of, lots of concerts. So I feel like I know you know music fairly well and can talk about it and no artists and some personally and, um, yeah, I'm excited to Give this rodeo a. you know, around the Around the corral, see what happens. 0:11:26 - Speaker 1Yeah, I think it's gonna be. I think it's gonna be fun and it's gonna be different. There are gonna be phases We're gonna listen to where you will like it more than others. I'm sure You know Pete the, the person that was telling you you got to listen to this. if this is your favorite record, You would like this. I can't even imagine saying that with the hips, because their uvra is like is all over the place. It starts out as real well, we'll get into it with the p, but it starts out It's, it's bar rock. It's you know, it's It's bluesy bar rock. They were disciples of, you know early Early garage and late 60s stones. You know that type of music. uh, I mean, they had a saxophone in the band, for god's sake, You know. so they were that type of band. Uh, the saxophone ultimately was gone by the time they started to record. That's uh, davis manning, um, but uh, Yeah, It's all over the map. It's all over the map. So why don't we kick into a live song right now and then we'll get talking about the record in in question here, which is the Tragically Hip EP. This is Dead Flowers by the Rolling Stones, covered by the Tragically Hip, with Davis Manning playing sax. Hope you like it. let's get into it. 0:13:20 - Speaker 5Talking to some rich folks that you knew And I hope you won't see me in my rated community. You know I could have been. Thank you, Send me Dead Flowers, by the way. You know, when you're sitting by in your own big black bag Making bets on Kentucky Dirt today, When I'm in my big skin room with a head on my head and a spoon, Another girl did jump in the way. Send me Dead Flowers, by the way. You know, when you're sitting by in your own big black bag Making bets on Kentucky Dirt today, Send me Dead Flowers, by the way. Take me down, let our sins and break me down. I know you think you're the queen of the underground. Send me Dead Flowers, by the way. Send me Dead Flowers, by the way. Send me Dead Flowers, by the way. 0:16:41 - Speaker 1Isn't that great, Yeah, Okay, before we get into the EP specifically, I just played you Dead Flowers and I sent you some other live tracks. Just want to get a sense of what you thought of that first group of songs and listening to this band play them live. 0:17:02 - Speaker 3I thought of so many different things as I first heard some of the songs. I mean, I instantly wondered about Gordon. Some of the songs were specific storytelling. I really wondered about his songwriting process, which I think is one of the most boring questions. I ask a band, But I immediately went to that His vibrato. Okay, that was like instantly, what is going on with this guy's voice and the way he sings? Is he trying to protect his vocal cords? I think some singers use vibrato when they're like on massive tours or something to exercise their voice or something. But you know, it sounded like a really good kind of bar rock and roll. to me That's what it sounded like. It sounded like I want to be in a club or in a bar with like a couple hundred people, You know, drinking not the bats Another great Canadian beer And just kind of rocking out. You could hear the fans loving the band. It sounded very 80s to me too, Very 80s. I mean it was like every song was its own book, if you will, Its own little story, and it just sounded like a reminder me of I don't know, Reminded me a little bit. His voice, reminded me a little bit of how Elvis sings, Reminded me a little bit of Freddie Mercury, But also a little bit sinister, like Glenn Danzig. 0:18:57 - Speaker 1I don't know if you guys know who he is. 0:18:58 - Speaker 3You know, it was just charismatic. He's a very charismatic guy. He's probably a lot of fun to hang out with Gordon. But yeah, it sounded very time specific to that era. 0:19:15 - Speaker 1Well, there's something about it that makes it more time. specific too, Pete. what did you think? 0:19:21 - Speaker 4Well, I gotta be honest with you, JD. I listened fully and completely to the actual EP, The live link that you sent me. The only one that I was able to hear was Highway Girl. 0:19:40 - Speaker 1Oh, and that's sort of cheating, because that came out in 91. So I'm sorry about that. 0:19:46 - Speaker 4No, no, not at all. I mean, I have my comments on the EP itself and kind of what I thought, But I don't want to jump the gun if you're not ready to hear that. 0:19:56 - Speaker 1But I got loads of thoughts, Cool. Well, that leads us to 1986 and them finding their way to a studio with Ken Greer. I'm not sure if you guys know who Ken Greer is. He's a Canadian as well. He was a producer, but he played in a band called Red Rider. If you're not familiar with Red Rider, check out the song Lunatic Fringe, Check out the song White Hot. Those are great songs and he was the guitarist in that band. but then he stepped away and started doing some production work. A friend of mine is the engineer on this record. I found that out years and years ago, but years after I had been a fan. I'm hoping to be able to talk to him for this podcast as well. It would be really cool to hear what he thought back in 86. This EP comes out in 87 on cassette prominently on cassette, but it does come out with a bonus song All Canadian Surf Club on the CD version. CDs were peaking through and they were making their way there. Three singles off this record Small Town, Bring Down Highway Girl and Last American Exit. I don't think that any of those songs are a surprise in terms of singles when you listen to the album in its entirety. This record isn't my favorite, but as a collection of songs it acts as sort of An amuse-bouche, as it were. What did you guys think of this record? This is your first time hearing it and first time talking about it. We'll start with you, Pete. 0:21:44 - Speaker 4I made a point of putting myself into multiple scenarios when I listened to it. I kept having this struggle because I remember you saying you said to me multiple times, and every Canadian who I've ever talked to about this band has said, oh, they started out as a bar band. I kind of got that in my head and I was like something I wanted to shed and not really pay attention to, because you don't really take a bar band seriously. You know what I mean A bar band is a bar band. But then I understood, the more I listened to it, kind of what you, What the Canadians, including yourself, JD, meant when you said that. And I got so much I mean I'll be honest with you The first track So the first time I listened to the record I went for a run And then I listened to it sitting at my desk and doing some work and then just kind of like alone, not doing anything, Not preoccupying myself with all this stuff. The first song, I was just like And you said that was a single, correct? 0:22:54 - Speaker 1Yeah, first single. 0:22:56 - Speaker 4It just. I mean, I was Every time wildly underwhelmed. It didn't hit me at all. Last American Exit it picked up a little bit and then Killing Time was just, I mean, that was a fucking bohemian. 0:23:50 - Speaker 5I got a kick when I walked down And I said I'd done my girl to tap To make my wounds with the sea dog sound A drink. I never wanted to, but it's for the never to take you back, My old man. I was all that bad. What you call compromise? I don't understand. What you call compromise. I don't understand. I walk away. I do you walk away? I walk away from a woman that comes down here on. She had done it wrong. I need your confidence even though you're mine When it gets right down to the killing time. I know your heart's bad, But it's all I've ever had. We can never lie on this righteous crime. I do you walk away. I do you walk away. I walk away from a woman that comes down here on. I know this time we walk away. you just can't walk away. I walk away from a woman that comes down here on. She had done it wrong. I do you walk away. you just can't walk away. I walk away from a woman that comes down here on. She had done it wrong. I need your confidence, even though you're mine, When it gets right down to the killing time. 0:27:50 - Speaker 4It just really really dug it. And what Tim said, too, is is it Rob Baker? 0:27:58 - Speaker 1Yeah, Rob. 0:27:59 - Speaker 4Baker. I can't remember what song was it, but I absolutely got some Huey Lewis vibes on his guitar tone. I mean it was super 80s, and not in a bad way. 0:28:12 - Speaker 1No, I hear you, It's very 80s, like production wise, Because it has no choice but to be. I mean, it was the 80s after all. 0:28:20 - Speaker 4But the weird thing about that is because I was hearing, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I was hearing some stuff in terms of like thinking about, okay, like I hear like some like the same sort of stuff you've heard going on in appetite, Because that was around the same time that that record came out. Appetite construction was what 86, 87. Yeah. But then what I really settled on was like there is a lot of like I hear a lot of that record in early Pearl Jam, early Alice in Chains. Yes, I mean his voice too, I think that record. you can see his voice progress into some amazing shit just by listening from song one to song seven or eight, whatever. 0:29:09 - Speaker 1Wow, Okay, We'll have to come back to that because that's really interesting. You can hear it right through the course of the record. 0:29:17 - Speaker 4Oh yeah. 0:29:18 - Speaker 1Tim, what were your initial thoughts? 0:29:21 - Speaker 3Eddie Vedder definitely came up for me because he has he'll get to this guttural I don't know what to call it this guttural vibrato thing where all of his syllables kind of run together and I feel like some of Gordon's singing goes the same way, but it really varies. Just going through the album, just first listening to it, I thought, okay, I kind of catch what this is. and Last American Exit kind of reeled me. back in small town, Bridgetown, was kind of like okay, that's interesting way to start The killing time in. Evelyn, you know, was like okay, who's this Evelyn gal? what is the story here? Like I wanted to know more conceptually what was going on in his head. That's kind of. I mean, I'm drawn to lyrics, you know, and at one point I was like, oh, maybe Evelyn's a cat, you know, I was feeling bad for her, I was worried about Evelyn, you know. but then Cemetery Side Road, so weird it's like let's throw this in there, you know. and so that got me kind of into not not deep rap at all, but you know, like I mentioned before, wanting to know about his process and hearing that they would play music and then he would basically put lyrics to music, and that kind of blew my mind too. not many bands do that. a lot of songwriters, you know, start with their prose or what have you. I don't know, I'm a werewolf baby. what? like kind of honestly did this come out around Halloween? like why, Why is that? Why is that in there? It's so weird. I think Highway Girl was the first song. like Pete was saying, Highway Girl is the first one I listened to and it was kind of a messed up sinister song. it's like where is this going? they're killing people, their cops are on the run, where we dump in the body like WTF is the tragically hip all about. But I will say All Canadian Surf Club. I've listened to that song the most times out of the world. 0:31:37 - Speaker 5There's a song for the summer. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. goes over real big. It's a song for the summer. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. It's a song for the summer. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. It's a song for the summer. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. It's a song for the summer. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. It's a song for the summer. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. It's a song for the summer. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. It's a song for the summer. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. It's a song for the summer. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. It's a song for the summer. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. It's a song for the summer. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. It's a song for the summer. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. It's a song for the summer. it's called the All Canadian Surf Club. 0:36:02 - Speaker 1Yeah, if this was a single song and I'm a werewolf baby, I don't know that I would have followed through on this band. 0:36:13 - Speaker 3It was really fun. but I'm like, okay, some of these songs are very specific to maybe parties people throw. I don't know, it's a wild mix. 0:36:26 - Speaker 1Yeah, yeah it is. And what's interesting is writing credit wise. the chief songwriter at this time is the bassist, Gord Sinclair, writing both songs and lyrics, or music and lyrics and melody. by and large, There's a few songs that are Gord Downey songs and he becomes. as time goes on, he becomes the chief lyricist. He's almost like a poet laureate of Canada, for heaven's sake. But on this one he's got Killin' Time. that he wrote and I'm a werewolf baby is on his docket, So is Highway Girl and so is nope. that's it for him. That's it for him. So I thought All Canadian Surf Club was him, but it was not. Pete, what did you think of All? 0:37:18 - Speaker 4Canadian Surf Club. At first it's really weird because I was like it's funny that you made the distinction about it being on the CD, Because I was like is this song belong in this record? Because it sounded that's the last song, correct? Yeah, it just sounded different, But I really liked it, Like All Canadian Surf Club. and then I started thinking about like is there a lot of surfing that goes on in Canada? And like started thinking like all the places in the world where people don't surf I would think Canada would definitely be on that list. 0:37:59 - Speaker 1Yeah, I don't know where, like there's, you know like little surfing, like little wave surfing, you know like Right. 0:38:07 - Speaker 5Or your water park. 0:38:08 - Speaker 1Yeah, but yeah, the water park, But yeah, not a great deal of surfing. Now, if you are listening to this and you're an avid surfer in Canada, then by all means reach out to us, JD, at getting hip to the hipcom and give us the old what's for there. 0:38:25 - Speaker 3Tofino is the place. I'll just say Tofino, that's tofino. 0:38:29 - Speaker 1Yeah, you know like that's. 0:38:30 - Speaker 3I mean it's on my list to go to someday. 0:38:33 - Speaker 1I'm being schooled here by the Pacific Northwestern. 0:38:38 - Speaker 3Yeah, well, I'm a West Coaster in general. There you go. 0:38:42 - Speaker 1So any themes or any themes or anything like that, throughout these songs um vibing you. I mean, this is, this is a band. you know they say you write your first record. you know, from the moment you start playing, This is what, this is what went down on wax as their, you know, as their first material. And then you enter, you know the sophomore slump or or whatever. but I can, I can assure you you know where we begin with. the next record up to here is, you know, not so much of a slump. but back to this record. Did you like the studio version of Highway Girl? Like, obviously, the live version is is riveting. What did you think of the studio version? 0:39:25 - Speaker 4I liked it. I liked it a lot because it would give you Highway Girl was the only one I had heard the live version of, But, um, I think I liked it a little bit more, but if I put myself in the context of like being at that show, yeah, yeah, I'd absolutely want to much rather see it live. Yeah, of course. 0:39:44 - Speaker 1Yeah, So these songs to me are written. it sounds, it sounds dumb, but this is, you know, a young band and they're not doing any trickery in the studio at all. These songs are written to be played right back on the road, you know, uh, leading the leading the charge of their, of their uh, of their gigs, so they can start to play less stones material and play more of their own material. You can hear that in theoh sorry, Oh no, no, go ahead, man No. 0:40:15 - Speaker 4I was just gonna say like there's some parts where you're just like I remember listening to it and being like dude. I mean I can Just what you said at the beginning, Tim. I could picture myself at a bar with like 100 or 150 people and hearing this band and like 80% of people in there, including the bar staff, singing along to it because it's just so catchy and, like you said, JD, it was like it was written to be played live. 0:40:46 - Speaker 1Yeah. 0:40:46 - Speaker 5You know, Yeah. 0:40:48 - Speaker 3And on the live version of Highway Girl. you know his storytelling. before they were even playing, the audience was eating up. I mean, you hear people laughing, you hear people cheering and I just imagined when they were on tour there was a lot, a lot of banter. I would just guess he's kind of a rambler, you know, connecting with the audience. But at the same time, like hearing that live version and hearing the audience and thinking about them being a bar band, like they really reminded me a lot of the Grateful Dead. Yeah, like I just just I don't know there's something very Bruce Springsteen about it. you know, upstate New York, Cleveland, Detroit kind of, but in all those regions, like the Grateful Dead was huge also and it's just this touring type of band that has a lot of followers. They're going to play like this mixed mash of hits, of songs that people love. you know there's they're going to be a little bit different every time. Just, I don't know there's something about them that didn't make me think jam band but made me think like, oh yeah, these guys definitely have. yeah, these guys definitely have. you know, in the 80s they probably had a couple hundred thousand like real fans by the end of the decade in Canada. Can you remind us where Canada is again? I forget. 0:42:16 - Speaker 1Canada lives on the roof of the USA and we intercept all airmail. 0:42:26 - Speaker 3Yeah, Highway Girl's a weird song, you know, I don't know just like. this whole album to me was kind of a pizza with the works. That's made me hungry but yeah. 0:42:36 - Speaker 5Yeah, I'll drink to that, Yeah. 0:42:38 - Speaker 1I like that. Well, any final thoughts on this record, or what you're looking for in the next record, or you know anything along those lines, Pete? 0:42:51 - Speaker 4You know, JD, you and I have obviously talked over time about the hip and I've talked a few other people, I think one of my co-workers, Barb, who's a big hip fan, and I. you know, I haven't really found a roadmap, It's just been this hodgepodge. It's like Tim said, you know it's been this pizza with the works, but I feel like I've digested this whole record, or I at least eaten it. I'm starting to digest it very well and I'm really excited for the next meal. I'm stoked to take the analogy step further, Like I'm genuinely excited for myself to listen, not for anybody else, if that makes sense. 0:43:42 - Speaker 1Oh, that's cool Yeah. 0:43:45 - Speaker 4Excited. 0:43:48 - Speaker 3I, you know, I really tried to refrain from any listening or research and tried to come up with what I knew about them beforehand and think about that. I guess I'm excited because it is a band from the 80s. I love 80s era music that I haven't really given a listen to. There are certain songs on this album that make me think okay, I can definitely hear some more from these guys, and there's some total headscratchers where I'm thinking what am I in store for? You know, I told my son about this whole exercise and his reaction was kind of like overwhelmed for me at the thought of focusing on one band, so much. And when I first listened to Small Town Bring Down, you know, in his presence we look at each other like oh no, What am I in for? Well, yeah, what is this band going to be like? I dig that song. No, I totally do. 0:44:56 - Speaker 1There's something about it that I grew up in a small town and something about that idea of you know not another small town, hometown, bring down Yeah sure It's generic, It was very storytelling also, though. 0:45:12 - Speaker 3but then, at last, American exit. when we got into listening to that, I was in the car, you know, driving from Detroit or wherever upstate New York, I don't know Coming into Canada, like I was kind of right there. It sounded kind of great. 0:48:59 - Speaker 5Yeah. 0:49:17 - Speaker 3And to know that this band… you know, played together first and then tried to play a handful of shows Till they, I guess, got their bearings and then recorded. I mean, that's what bands did in the 70s and 80s for sure. You know, it wasn't very often that somebody got together and somebody already had 20 songs and they went and recorded. You know, so it's, it's so. this is a pretty a special, you know way to Start up a group. So I'm curious to, I'm curious to hear where they go. I like, I like some of the songs, you know, Yeah well, it gets pretty, it gets. 0:50:02 - Speaker 1You know we're off on a journey. Let's put it that way. This will be. I do, like you know, to carry on the food analogy, I do like this you're in a new country and every day you're gonna get a new dish and it's it's gonna be spiced a little bit differently. Early on it's gonna be a little bit more rudimentary, But as we go on there's gonna be more nuance and you know deeper flavor profiles. and then there's context. you start to Listen to the songs differently because you start to understand the past and what this group has went through and when, ultimately, they played their last show in Kingston, Ontario, and You know almost a third of this country tuned in to watch that like it was like 11, over 11 million people watch. She's the last concert because they broadcast it on our national broadcaster, CBC. Wow, yeah, you know The they they've. they cover a great distance between that time and what you guys are listening to right now. 0:51:04 - Speaker 3So it'll be interesting to To hear from you on this journey as we continue on one other just little mysterious kind of wow fact that I read about them was having to do with Them being double booked with Nirvana in 94. Do you know about this? 0:51:24 - Speaker 1Yeah, they played. they played a show in Milwaukee. It was eight dollars a ticket and it was right to the hip and right. Anna Nirvana was actually opening for the hip. that not opening. it was a double bill, but you know, yeah and. The story from from all the books is that Gord went to go meet Or the band rather went to go meet Kurt and he was passed out on a pool table like he was. he was dead to the world, So they didn't end up getting to meet, but we'll hear an interesting Tribute to Mr Cobain in in a future song, for sure. 0:52:00 - Speaker 3Yeah, I'm intrigued. I'm intrigued, no more. 0:52:02 - Speaker 1Okay, before we say goodbye, we're gonna do one more thing. We are gonna pick an MVP track, One track that you'll take away, that you'll put on a playlist. we're gonna do a playlist for each of you and It'll have your takeaway track from each record, and then you know, when we're done this exercise, We can put those up on Spotify and Apple music. 0:52:23 - Speaker 4Well, for me, I'll do it for me while you're. while you're thumbing through it, Tim, for me, I think the track on this EP would the one that I would Would choose to be would be killing time. Yeah, okay, certainly, certainly, Certainly, to stand out for me might, if I had to pick. Well, you do be a crowd, so there you go. 0:52:52 - Speaker 1Where you at there, Timmy, Hmm, Hmm. 0:52:54 - Speaker 5Hmm. 0:52:55 - Speaker 1Oh, you're gonna predict it. 0:52:57 - Speaker 3I was kind of all over with this. I was no, that's hilarious, I know what you're gonna do too. I was kind of all over with this album. You know it was full of surprises for me. you know I already talked about Evelyn and You know it's like oh, poor Evelyn. whatever The werewolf I'm a werewolf baby Hilarious, like where is this fan going? like, this was a wild ride of an album for me. highway girl, I think was a first song you sent us JD, and That one has so many twists and turns and it just, I think, the most. My recollection, like maybe the most listens, was on that album from via Spotify, highway girl, But it closed out early, strong with me for all Canadian surf club. I think that's a fun sign. No, My. California homie right there. 0:53:51 - Speaker 1AP hadn't written down the whole time for those watching at home. 0:53:55 - Speaker 3That was a fun track. 0:53:57 - Speaker 1That's what, uh, we call the first episode. right there, boom done, theater the mind, we traveled straight out of Kingston. Thanks a lot, fellas. It means a lot. Thanks, JD. 0:54:07 - Speaker 3Can't wait. 0:54:07 - Speaker 1Thanks guys pick up your shit. 0:54:11 - Speaker 2Thanks for listening to getting hip to the hip. Please subscribe, share, rate and review the show at getting hip to the hipcom. Find us on Twitter and Instagram at getting hip pot And join our Facebook group at facebookcom slash groups slash fully and completely. Questions or concerns email us at JD. at getting hip to the hipcom. We'd love to hear from you. 0:54:52 - Speaker 1Do, Do, Do, Do, Do, Do, Do, Do Do. Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/gettinghiptothehip/exclusive-content

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